WTI crude oil prices are staging a bit of a comeback, recovering after falling to the lowest levels seen in three weeks during the previous session; however, the sentiment remains affected by worries over the impact of rising COVID-19 cases across China and several other countries. At the time of writing, WTI crude oil is trading at around $67.45 per barrel.

On Monday, WTI oil lost around 2.6% of its value after China saw its total caseload climb to the highest level seen so far, with numbers overtaking the count seen when the outbreak first started. Authorities across several cities in the country have ramped up testing to contain local transmissions of the delta variant of the virus and bring the pandemic under control.

Meanwhile, the number of COVID-19 cases are also climbing higher across the US and impacting travel, which in turn is hurting oil demand further. In other parts of the world as well, governments are imposing strict curbs to prevent the spread of infection, which is weighing on crude oil on the demand side.

Oil prices received some support early on Tuesday, however, over expectations that crude inventories across the US are likely to have fallen over the past week. According to a recent Reuters poll, crude stockpiles across the US are forecast to drop by 1.1 million barrels over the previous week.

Looking forward, oil traders are likely to focus on the API and EIA crude inventories’ reports releasing this week. However, moves in crude oil are likely to be driven mainly by the sentiment surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic’s latest wave.