An independent evaluation of the global response to the coronavirus pandemic, including steps taken by the World Health Organization, will be led by former Prime Minister of New Zealand Helen Clark and former President of Liberia Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. The former world leaders will co-chair and Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response (IPPR), the […] Continue reading ->
A new Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) Action Fund will inject nearly US $1 billion into the collapsing antibiotic development pipeline, aiming to bring two to four new antibiotics to patients by 2030. The investment, organized by the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations and 23 different pharma companies, is the biggest single investment in antibiotic […] Continue reading ->
First came the dry cough. Then the shortness of breath and fever. But what Noely, a 32 year old COVID-19 patient in Lima Peru, hadn’t expected, was her lost sense of taste, worsening anxiety, and impaired motor function. “At first, I had symptoms of atypical pneumonia, with a lot of chest pain, and I lost […] Continue reading ->
BREAKING – The United States on Tuesday gave formal notice to the United Nations and the US Congress that it intends to withdraw from the World Health Organization as of 6 July 2021, following President Donald Trump’s announcement after the World Health Assembly on 18 May. The administration first notified the United Nations, and sent […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization said Tuesday that it would reconsider its longtime stance that airborne transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus occurs only rarely – after a group of over 239 scientists published a commentary on Monday in the Journal of Clinical Infectious Diseases, urging the agency to acknowledge the greater role played by tiny virus […] Continue reading ->
Cape Town, South Africa – The US government’s recent purchase of almost the entire available stock of Gilead’s remdesivir – a medicine shown to help speed up the recovery of people who are moderately sick with COVID-19 – has raised fears about whether poorer countries will also be left in the dust if a vaccine […] Continue reading ->
A growing bloc of aerosol scientists, epidemiologists, and infectious disease experts are urging the World Health Organization to acknowledge that particles containing SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, can remain suspended in the air for hours and be inhaled, potentially representing another route of transmission. Some 239 scientists from around the world urged the WHO […] Continue reading ->
Ibadan, Nigeria – The first time that businessman Soji Adegbite missed his flight, he was heading to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from Nigeria’s Murtala Muhammed International Airport located in Africa’s largest city of Lagos. “I got there just five minutes late but that was all it took to miss the flight,” he told Health Policy Watch. […] Continue reading ->
Access to life-saving dexamethasone will be expanded to some 4.5 million COVID-19 patients in low- and middle-income countries through an advance bulk purchase of the drug in bulk, UNITAID has said. The move is the first concrete step by a global health agency under the umbrella of the WHO ACT accelerator partnership to boost access […] Continue reading ->
In the past three decades, global fish consumption has surged by a stunning 122%. Yet today, only 66% of global stocks are fished within sustainable levels, in comparison to 90% in the 1970s. “There is no healthy planet without a healthy ocean, and the healthy ocean is currently in decline”, said Peter Thomson at a conference Tuesday on overfishing […] Continue reading ->