While three independent review panels concur that the response of the World Health Organization (WHO) to COVID-19 was inadequate, member states made slow progress in charting better alternatives at the executive board meeting on Wednesday. WHO members are considering three main proposals to improve the global body’s future pandemic preparedness:  Setting up a Standing Committee […] Continue reading ->
Despite earlier disruption from Ethiopia, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus received overwhelming support for his nomination for a second term as World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General from the body’s executive board on Tuesday. As the only nominee, Tedros is guaranteed to be re-elected at the next World Health Assembly in May. All WHO regions expressed their […] Continue reading ->
Unless a future pandemic ‘instrument’ is properly financed and legally binding, it will not be able to prevent health emergencies, numerous member states told the World Health Organization’s (WHO) 150th executive board meeting on Monday. Speaking on behalf of Africa’s 47 member states, Kenya’s Dr Cleopa Mailu said there should be a “radical disruption” of […] Continue reading ->
CAPE TOWN – South African-born US biotech billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong launched a vaccine manufacturing plant in the country of his birth on Wednesday, aimed at producing “second generation” vaccines to address COVID-19 and other diseases. Soon-Shiong, who has made his fortune from developing successful cancer treatments, has committed an initial $195 million to NantSA – […] Continue reading ->
World Health Organization (WHO) researchers and partners are “constantly looking at” animals’ susceptibility to COVID-19, and transmission both from humans to animals and vice versa, WHO’s Dr Maria van Kerkhove told the global body’s weekly briefing on Tuesday. “We understand there are a number of species that can be infected with SARS-CoV2 and then there’s […] Continue reading ->
The inequitable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines is the result of the “complete collapse of global co-operation and solidarity”, Dr John Nkengasong, Director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), told a panel on vaccine equity at the World Economic Forum on Tuesday. “The moral failures that we witnessed over the last […] Continue reading ->
A fourth COVID-19 booster mRNA vaccine has proven ineffective against Omicron infection, according to preliminary research from Israel released on Monday. “Despite a significant increase in antibodies after the fourth vaccine, this protection is only partially effective against the Omicron strain, which is relatively resistant to the vaccine,” lead researcher Prof Gili Regev-Yochay, told a […] Continue reading ->
Rwanda became the recipient of the one-billionth COVID-19 vaccine delivered by COVAX, the global platform set up to ensure equitable access to the vaccines,announced last Friday. After numerous supply problems – most seriously when its key supplier, the Serum Insitute of India, was banned from exporting its vaccines by the Indian government – COVAX was […] Continue reading ->