Representatives from Brazil, Egypt, Japan, Netherlands, South Africa, and Thailand are to make up the World Health Organization (WHO) Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) on a future pandemic instrument, according to Knowledge Ecology International. The countries each represent a different region of the WHO, namely Africa (South Africa), the Americas, known as the Pan-American Health Organisation […] Continue reading ->
Some 21 countries have now ratified the African Medicines Agency treaty – well beyond the 15 ratifications reached in November 2021, which allowed the AMA treaty instrument to formally take effect. Egypt, Africa’s third most populous country, is the most recent state to have both ratified and deposited the treaty – marking a significant milestone […] Continue reading ->
Cancer services remain backlogged in many parts of the world due to the effects of the two-year-long COVID pandemic – even as Europe hopes a pandemic “ceasefire that could bring us enduring peace” , said WHO’s European Regional Director Hans Kluge Thursday on the eve of World Cancer Day. Meanwhile, in Latin America, routine childhood […] Continue reading ->
Switzerland could be the next European country to lift virtually all COVID restrictions, federal officials said Wednesday – despite warnings from the World Health Organization, headquartered in Geneva, that a total relaxation of the pandemic rules could be premature. In a press briefing on Wednesday, Swiss federal government officials lifted all work-from-home and some quarantine […] Continue reading ->
In Unusual Move, US FDA Invites Pfizer to Request COVID-19 Vaccine Approval for Infants and Toddlers
What does the FDA know that we don’t? Hopefully a lot. Without offering much detail, the FDA yesterday afternoon asked Pfizer to send over a rolling submission to amend its Covid-19 vaccine Emergency Use Authorization to include children 6 months to under 5 years of age. The tricky part in making such a request is […] Continue reading ->
Moderna and the nonprofit science research organization IAVI have administered the first doses in a Phase I clinical trial of an experimental HIV vaccine, delivered by messenger RNA (mRNA) – the technology that revolutionized vaccines against COVID-19. The trial kicked off last week at George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences in Washington, […] Continue reading ->
The world is “sick and tired” of COVID-19, World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus acknowledged but warned that Omicron posed a substantial threat to global health, having caused 90 million infections in the past 10 weeks – more than all the cases recorded in 2021. Tedros’s appeal came as Denmark lifted […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) is considering changing how it relates to non-state actors (NSAs), but some of these organisations are concerned that the changes envisaged by the global body may weaken their voices. In 2016, the WHO’s World Health Assembly (WHA) adopted a Framework for Engagement with NSAs – known as FENSA – to […] Continue reading ->
Almost four times the usual medical waste was generated in New Delhi during the height of India’s COVID-19 pandemic in May 2021 when all COVID-19 waste was mistakenly classified as infectious, according to a new report issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday. Most of the approximately 87,000 tonnes of personal protective equipment […] Continue reading ->
An innovative WHO “Health for Peace Initiative” that aims to build bridges in conflict zone and humanitarian settings through global health initiatives ran into some rough waters at last week’s Executive Board meeting – with the United States saying that it should include a human rights element – while Russia warned WHO against “politicizing” its […] Continue reading ->