Equity and intellectual property (IP) rights are – unsurprisingly – the most important and trickiest issues facing countries negotiating the terms on which the next global pandemic will be addressed. This emerged at a World Health Organization (WHO) briefing on Thursday addressed by Precious Matsoso, co-chair of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) crafting a pandemic […] Continue reading ->
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the first-ever vaccine for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). The single-shot vaccine intended for use in adults aged 60 or older represents the culmination of six decades of research to protect the world from RSV. With the green light from the FDA on Wednesday, GSK’s Arexvy vaccine […] Continue reading ->
There is widespread speculation that the World Health Organization (WHO) will decide that COVID-19 is no longer a “Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)” when its expert group convenes on Thursday. The 15th meeting of the Emergency Committee for COVID-19 has been convened by the WHO Director-General in terms of the International Health Regulations […] Continue reading ->
The conspiracy-based anti-science attacks on scientists and vaccines that proliferated during the COVID-19 pandemic in the US are likely to have chilling, long-term effects on biomedicine, according to Professor Peter Hotez, Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.  The biggest casualty may be childhood vaccinations, leading to […] Continue reading ->
The momentum from last week’s World Malaria Day needs to translate into more resources to address the global funding shortfall to achieve 2030 malaria targets. Since the turn of the century, global partnership and sustained investment have completely transformed the fight against malaria – preventing two billion malaria cases, saving 11.7 million lives, and putting […] Continue reading ->
Uganda’s Parliament passed a revised Anti-Homosexuality Bill on Tuesday, retaining executions for certain same-sex activity and introducing harsher penalties for some categories of ‘offences’. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni had declined to sign into law an earlier version of the Bill after the Deputy Attorney General (DAG) had advised him that it would be open to […] Continue reading ->
By the end of 2022, COVID-19 vaccines delivered by the global vaccine access initiative, COVAX,  helped to avert 2.7 million deaths across 92 lower-income countries, according a new report based on modelling by researchers from Imperial College London. COVAX’s biggest success was in low-income countries, where its vaccines were responsible for three-quarters of all deaths […] Continue reading ->