Covid-19′s global death toll tops 5 million in under 2 years

‘The global death toll from COVID-19 topped 5 million on Monday, less than two years into a crisis that has not only devastated poor countries but also humbled wealthy ones with first-rate health care systems. Together, the United States, the European Union, Britain and Brazil — all upper-middle- or high-income countries — account for one-eighth of the world’s population but nearly half of all reported deaths. The U.S. alone has recorded over 745,000 lives lost, more than any other nation.’

Read here (AP, Nov 1, 2021)

Covid: Virus may have killed 80k-180k health workers, WHO says

‘Covid has severely affected healthcare staff and may have killed between 80,000 and 180,000, the World Health Organization (WHO) says. Healthcare workers must be prioritised for vaccines, WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, and he criticised unfairness in the distribution of jabs. The deaths occurred between January 2020 and May of this year.’

Read here (BBC, Oct 19, 2021)

Leader of WHO’s new pandemic hub: Improve data flow to extinguish outbreaks

Former Nigeria CDC leader Chikwe Ihekweazu talks with Nature about the COVID crisis, and strengthening global response to future public-health emergencies...

What are the biggest problems you hope to fix — and why do you want to solve them at the WHO?

‘I want to make the mechanics of reporting disease-related information easier, and also demonstrate that the WHO can use that data to help countries that share it. One way to do that is to enable countries to derive value from their own data.

‘I wouldn’t want to do this at a venue other than the WHO. I know that different countries are creating hubs, as are some big donors. They may be able to analyse publicly available data, but they won’t have the same access to information from countries that the WHO does. Speaking as the current director of the Nigeria CDC, I can tell you that I wouldn’t share my data openly with a hub located in another country. We share our data with the WHO without worry because the WHO belongs to us and other countries as a member-state organization, and has a mandate from countries to monitor health risks and coordinate the response in health emergencies.’

Read here (Nature, Sept 21, 2021)

Nutrition and Covid-19: WHO

• Nutrition advice for adults during the COVID-19 outbreak
• Feeding babies and young children during the COVID-19 outbreak
• Breastfeeding advice during the COVID-19 outbreak

Read here (WHO East Mediterranean as at Sept 2020)

WHO more doubtful about vaccines ending pandemic

‘The head of WHO Europe was today pessimistic about vaccines’ ability to put an end to the Covid pandemic, as new variants dash hopes of reaching herd immunity. Faced with the possibility that the virus may be around for many years, health officials must now “anticipate how to gradually adapt our vaccination strategy”, in particular on the question of additional doses, Hans Kluge told reporters.’

Read here (Free Malaysia Today, Sept 10, 2021)

India may be reaching ‘endemicity’ after emerging from second COVID-19 wave

‘The number of new COVID-19 cases and deaths in India has dropped dramatically since a second wave of the virus peaked in May. First the Alpha and then the Delta variant — which was first detected in India and is now causing strife elsewhere in the world — ravaged the country. But the seven-day average of daily reported cases this week is just a tenth of the 400,000 recorded during the peak.

‘According to health authorities, more than 439,000 people in India have now died with the virus. The relatively stable numbers, which lasted throughout August, prompted the World Health Organization's chief scientist to suggest India may have reached a state of "endemicity". That is, it may be endemic or constantly present in a particular place. So how did they get there and is the worst of the pandemic over for India?’

Read here (ABC News, Sept 6, 2021)

WHO starts data-sharing effort to prevent pandemics. Will nations cooperate?

‘WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence opens in Berlin backed by initial US$100 million from Germany. It aims to pool global disease data, and produce tools to predict outbreaks – but is reliant on countries taking part.’

Read here (South China Morning Post, Sept 3, 2021)

Investigate the origins of Covid-19: ‘Take hypotheses about both natural and laboratory spillovers seriously’

‘As scientists with relevant expertise, we agree with the WHO director-general, the United States and 13 other countries, and the European Union that greater clarity about the origins of this pandemic is necessary and feasible to achieve. We must take hypotheses about both natural and laboratory spillovers seriously until we have sufficient data. A proper investigation should be transparent, objective, data-driven, inclusive of broad expertise, subject to independent oversight, and responsibly managed to minimize the impact of conflicts of interest. Public health agencies and research laboratories alike need to open their records to the public. Investigators should document the veracity and provenance of data from which analyses are conducted and conclusions drawn, so that analyses are reproducible by independent experts.’

Read here (Science, May 14, 2021)

Gavi in talks with China's Sinopharm, other vaccine makers for Covax doses

‘The GAVI Vaccine Alliance is in talks with COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers including China's state-owned Sinopharm to expand the COVAX pipeline and secure doses for distribution, a GAVI spokeswoman said on Monday.

‘Sinopharm received emergency use listing from the World Health Organization (WHO) last Friday, making it eligible for the COVAX programme and bolstering Beijing's push for a bigger role in inoculating the world.

‘COVAX, run jointly by GAVI and the WHO to provide doses to the world's poorest people, has hit major supply problems. To date the AstraZeneca (AZN.L) shot made by the Serum Institute of India account for most doses rolled out, but authorities there have restricted exports because of India's massive epidemic.’

Read here (Reuters, May 10, 2021)

Indian Covid mutant more contagious, but not vaccine resistant: Top WHO scientist

“Surge in India increases chances of more dangerous variants emerging. Prelim data shows that Indian variant is more contagious. There is heterogeneity in India in terms of spread of Covid-19. WHO is concerned about number of cases and deaths in India. Globally, cases and deaths have plateaued, not in South Asia. South East Asia is seeing case rise owing to India. Overall numbers hide what is going on, need to go deeper in state, local level data,” she said.

‘Speaking on efficacy of vaccines available in India, she assured, “There is no enough data to show that double mutant is vaccine resistant. All the available vaccines today in India and elsewhere prevent severe disease and death even if you get up the infection. You are not going to end up in the ICU critically ill. The message is take the vaccine whichever is available and you eligible for it. If your turn is there, please take it.”

Read here (Yahoo, May 10, 2021)

WHO panel against requiring vaccination proof for travel

‘The World Health Organisation’s emergency committee said Monday (April 19) it was against international travellers being required to have proof of vaccination, partly on grounds such a measure would deepen inequities.

“Do not require proof of vaccination as a condition of entry, given the limited (although growing) evidence about the performance of vaccines in reducing transmission and the persistent inequity in the global vaccine distribution,” the committee said in a statement summarising its April 15 meeting, the results of which were only published on Monday.

“States Parties are strongly encouraged to acknowledge the potential for requirements of proof of vaccination to deepen inequities and promote differential freedom of movement,” the committee added.’

Read here (Straits Times, Apr 19, 2021)

Covid-19 and mandatory vaccination: Ethical considerations and caveats

‘Vaccines are one of the most effective tools for protecting people against COVID-19. Consequently, with COVID-19 vaccination under way or on the horizon in many countries, some may be considering whether to make COVID-19 vaccination mandatory in order to increase vaccination rates and achieve public health goals and, if so, under what conditions, for whom and in what contexts.

‘It is not uncommon for governments and institutions to mandate certain actions or types of behaviour in order to protect the wellbeing of individuals or communities. Such policies can be ethically justified, as they may be crucial to protect the health and wellbeing of the public. Nevertheless, because policies that mandate an action or behaviour interfere with individual liberty and autonomy, they should seek to balance communal well-being with individual liberties (1). While interfering with individual liberty does not in itself make a policy intervention unjustified, such policies raise a number of ethical considerations and concerns and should be justified by advancing another valuable social goal, like protecting public health.

‘This document does not provide a position that endorses or opposes mandatory COVID-19 vaccination. Rather, it identifies important ethical considerations and caveats that should be explicitly evaluated and discussed through ethical analysis by governments and/or institutional policy-makers who may be considering mandates for COVID-19 vaccination.’

Download here (WHO Policy Brief, April 13, 2021)

How can we vaccinate the world? Five challenges facing the UN-backed COVAX programme

‘Vaccines are a key part of the solution to ending the COVID-19 pandemic and, since the early stages of the crisis, the World Health Organization (WHO) has argued that there needs to be a coordinated approach towards ensuring that everyone, not just people living in rich countries,  receives adequate protection from the virus, as it spread rapidly across the world.

‘Out of this concern grew the Global COVAX Facility, the only global initiative that is working with governments and manufacturers to ensure COVID-19 vaccines are available worldwide to both higher and lower income countries.  

‘Here are five things to know about the challenges facing COVAX, and how they can be overcome...

1. Export controls: the weakest link?
2. Getting vaccines to those who need them is not easy
3. More funding is needed to help rollout in the poorest countries
4. Richer countries should share excess doses
5. Vaccine hesitancy: a continued cause for concern 

Read here (UN News, Apr 5, 2021) 

World leaders, WHO push for pandemic preparedness treaty

‘Global leaders and the World Health Organisation (WHO) are pushing for an international treaty that would boost the world's ability to respond to a future pandemic, saying it is a matter of time before the next infectious pathogen emerges.

‘The goal is to prevent a recurrence of the missteps that have dogged the global response to the Covid-19 pandemic - from the scramble for personal protective equipment at the start to current issues over the distribution of vaccines.

‘The call to establish a framework to share information, diagnostics, technology and essentials like vaccines and personal protective equipment comes as a WHO-led team published its highly anticipated findings after a mission to Wuhan, China, and concluded that Covid-19 most likely originated from bats and not a laboratory.’

Read here (Straits Times, Mar 31, 2021)

Data withheld from WHO team probing Covid-19 origins in China: Tedros

‘Although the team concluded that a leak from a Wuhan laboratory was the least likely hypothesis for the virus that causes COVID-19, Tedros said the issue required further investigation, potentially with more missions to China. "I do not believe that this assessment was extensive enough," he told member states in remarks released by the WHO. "Further data and studies will be needed to reach more robust conclusions."

‘The WHO team's leader, Peter Ben Embarek, told a press briefing it was "perfectly possible" the virus had been circulating in November or October 2019 around Wuhan, and so potentially spreading abroad earlier than documented so far. "We got access to quite a lot of data in many different areas, but of course there were areas where we had difficulties getting down to the raw data and there are many good reasons for that," he said, citing privacy laws and other restrictions.’

Read here (Reuters, Mar 31, 2021)

WHO says Covid-19 likely passed from bats to humans through another animal

‘The coronavirus probably spread from bats to humans via another animal, with the likelihood it was leaked from a lab in China “extremely unlikely”, according to the long-awaited results of a joint World Health Organisation-China study into the origins of Covid-19 reported by the Associated Press. 

‘The findings align with what researchers said last month, at the end of their mission to Wuhan, the central Chinese city where the first Covid cases emerged at the end of 2019, and in their subsequent public comments, including to Bloomberg News.

‘The scientists proposed further research in every area except the lab leak hypothesis, the AP reported on Monday (March 29), citing a draft copy of the report, which it said left many questions unanswered.’

Read here (Straits Times, Mar 29, 2021)

WHO approves J&J's COVID-19 vaccine for emergency listing

‘The World Health Organization on Friday (Mar 12) approved the emergency listing of Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine, giving its seal of approval to expedite use especially in countries with weaker regulatory agencies. It is the third COVID-19 vaccine after the two-shot regimens of Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca to receive backing from the WHO, and the first requiring just a single injection.’

Read here (Channel News Asia, Mar 13, 2021)

A year on, WHO still struggling to manage pandemic response

‘When the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic one year ago Thursday, it did so only after weeks of resisting the term and maintaining that the highly infectious virus could still be stopped. A year later, the U.N. agency is still struggling to keep on top of the evolving science of COVID-19, to persuade countries to abandon their nationalistic tendencies and help get vaccines where they’re needed most.

‘The agency made some costly missteps along the way: It advised people against wearing masks for months and asserted that COVID-19 wasn’t widely spread in the air. It also declined to publicly call out countries — particularly China — for mistakes that senior WHO officials grumbled about privately. That created some tricky politics that challenged WHO’s credibility and wedged it between two world powers, setting off vociferous Trump administration criticism that the agency is only now emerging from.’

Read here (APNews, Mar 11, 2021)

Coronavirus crisis unlikely to be over by the end of the year, WHO warns

‘Despite the spread of Covid-19 being slowed in some countries due to lockdowns and vaccination programs, it is “premature” and “unrealistic” to the think the pandemic will be over by the end of the year, the World Health Organization’s executive director of emergency services has said.

‘Speaking at a press briefing Geneva, Dr Michael Ryan said while vaccinating the most vulnerable people, including healthcare workers, would help remove the “tragedy and fear” from the situation, and would help to ease pressure on hospitals, the “virus is very much in control”.’

Read here (The Guardian, Mar 2, 2021) 

Countries urge drug companies to share vaccine know-how

‘Across Africa and Southeast Asia, governments and aid groups, as well as the World Health Organization, are calling on pharmaceutical companies to share their patent information more broadly to meet a yawning global shortfall in a pandemic that already has claimed over 2.5 million lives. Pharmaceutical companies that took taxpayer money from the U.S. or Europe to develop inoculations at unprecedented speed say they are negotiating contracts and exclusive licensing deals with producers on a case-by-case basis because they need to protect their intellectual property and ensure safety.’

Read here (AP, Mar 2, 2021)