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World in no better place to fight pandemics than before COVID – review

London, UK
Reuters

The world is no better prepared for a new pandemic than it was when coronavirus emerged in 2019 and may actually be in a worse place given the economic toll, according to a panel set up by the World Health Organization to evaluate the global response. 

A lack of progress on reforms such as international health regulations means the world is as vulnerable as ever, the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response said in its report.

Switzerland Geneva WHO logo

The World Health Organization logo is pictured at the entrance of the WHO building, in Geneva, Switzerland, on 20th December, 2021. PICTURE: Reuters/Denis Balibouse/File photo.

The authors, led by former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and former President of Liberia Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, acknowledged some progress, including on more robust funding for the WHO, but said the process was going far too slowly.

“We have right now the very same tools and the same system that existed in December 2019 to respond to a pandemic threat. And those tools just weren’t good enough,” Clark told reporters. 

“If there were a new pandemic threat this year, next year, or the year after at least, we will be largely in the same place…maybe worse, given the tight fiscal space of many, if not most, countries right now.” 



Wednesday’s report comes ahead of next week’s World Health Assembly in Geneva, the WHO’s annual decision-making forum, which is expected to address some of the issues raised. 

While the body welcomed some steps forward, including moves to establish a separate global health security fund within the World Bank, it warned that global interest was waning and the years it will take to set up other instruments – including a potential pandemic treaty, an international agreement to improve preparedness – were too long. 

The panel called for a high-level meeting at the UN General Assembly and independent health threats council led by heads-of-state to galvanise action. 

“Only the highest-level political leadership has the legitimacy to bring multiple sectors together in this way,” Sirleaf said in a statement.


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Meanwhile, Pan American Health Organization said on Wednesday that COVID-19 is on the rise again in the Americas as many countries have abandoned measures like masking and social distancing and many lag in vaccination rates.

Cases in the Americas surged 27.2 per cent last week from the prior one, driven primarily by a spike in infections in the United States, according to PAHO.

More than half of a total 918,000 infections came from North America as US cases jumped by 33 per cent to 605,000 in the last week. Infections in North America have now been climbing for the past seven weeks.

PAHO Director Dr Carissa Etienne noted that many countries and local governments are giving up measures to protect against the virus and have reopened borders after a period of lower transmission.

“Masking and social distancing have served us well since the start of the pandemic and are still valid measures to lower virus transmission,” she said, adding that governments should be ready to scale up these measures whenever there is an increase in cases or deaths.

Too many people remain at risk, PAHO said, as only 14 of the 51 countries and territories in the Americas have reached the World Health Organization’s goal of vaccinating 70 per cent of their population, she added during a news conference.

PAHO said new COVID-19 infections and deaths in the region have been rising steadily over the past four weeks, with over 3,500 fatalities reported last week.

Central America saw the largest percentage rise in cases, with infections soaring by 80 per cent. In Brazil, the second most populated country in the Americas, infections increased by nine per cent to 120,000.

“It is time to take stock of these numbers and act. COVID is again on the rise in the Americas,” Etienne said. “The truth is this virus is not going away anytime soon.”

– With GABRIEL ARAUJO and STEVEN GRATTAN

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