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 ->
February 20, 2020, was the day on which the first COVID-19 case was recorded in Mexico. The infected person was a 35-year-old man from Mexico City, the capital of the Latin American country, who had travelled to Italy. The announcement was made by Hugo López Gatell, epidemiologist and undersecretary of Prevention and Health Promotion of […] Continue reading ->
CEOs from the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies issued a call to G7 leaders on Friday to oppose the inclusion of intellectual property rights waivers and pathogen benefit sharing in the World Health Organization’s (WHO) pandemic treaty. In meetings with Japanese Prime Minister and chair of next month’s G7 summit Fumio Kishida this week, a delegation […] Continue reading ->
When governments invest in drug research and development (R&D) with pharmaceutical companies, they should ensure upfront that these drugs are affordable and widely available – and a global pandemic accord needs to provide high-level guidance on how to do this. This is the view of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi), a non-profit group […] Continue reading ->
The fifth meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) to draft a pandemic accord started on Monday with acknowledgement by World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus that it faces a very tight timeframe. “There is now only one year until the World Health Assembly in May 2024, which will consider the outcome […] Continue reading ->
DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania—Blaring Singeli music is one of the few sources of entertainment for poor slum dwellers in Manzese, part of Tanzania’s smoke-belching capital city of Dar es Salaam. But for the 32-year-old Mariam Kinesha, the electronic music known for its fast beats, exuberant shaking dance style and muddled MC-driven lyrics, is not only […] Continue reading ->
Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in December 2019, an explosion of information and misinformation burned across the Internet. Health experts and officials had a choice: To turn a blind eye to the fake news being shared on social networks or to take action themselves and use these portals to disseminate essential information rapidly. […] Continue reading ->
Negotiations on a global pandemic accord resume next Monday at the fifth meeting of the World Health Organization (WHO)’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) amid calls for more attention to be paid to a One Health approach, and less to organised misinformation campaigns. The meeting agenda is an extension of the INB meeting that ended on […] Continue reading ->
Raccoon dogs, lab leaks and Chinese secrecy have made for high drama as scientists who think they may have found the elusive “Animal X” that passed SARS-CoV2 were excluded from a data-sharing platform for “scooping” Chinese scientists. Nineteen scientists, including world-renowned figures such as Dr Michael Worobey and Dr Angela Rasmussen – have published a […] Continue reading ->
New evidence indicating that raccoon dogs from the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan may have been infected with SARS CoV2 in January 2020 was published on a shared database by China’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in January – but removed recently after scientists started asking questions. This was revealed at a media briefing […] Continue reading ->