Almost three years of harsh lockdowns, enforced quarantines in state facilities and daily testing have tried the patience of many Chinese people, who since Friday have taken to the streets from Shanghai and Nanjing in the east, to central Chengdu and Wuhan and Urumqi and Korla in the north and west. While scores of people […] Continue reading ->
Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni has extended quarantine measures in the two districts at the epicentre of the country’s Ebola epidemic for another 21 days, citing the need to protect gains in the fight against the virus. This marks the third renewal of lockdowns in Kassanda and Mubende, and authorities are hopeful it will be the […] Continue reading ->
Little agreement emerged from an informal World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting on Tuesday about whether an intellectual property (IP) waiver should be extended to COVID-19 therapeutics and diagnostics. But low and middle-income countries (LMIC) that qualify for free COVID-19 anti-virals Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir) and Molnupiravir have shown so little interest in accepting donations that some question […] Continue reading ->
As the first snows fall across Ukraine, World Health Organization officials in Kyiv warn the coming winter will be “life-threatening for millions” of Ukrainians. At a press conference in Kyiv on Monday, WHO’s European Regional Director Dr Hans Kluge called the Russian airstrikes on Ukraine’s energy and medical infrastructure “the largest attack on health care […] Continue reading ->
Regional production of vaccines and other pandemic-related products – and sharing the technical know-how to enable this – features strongly in the much-anticipated first draft of the global pandemic treaty proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO) to guide future pandemics. WHO member states will be briefed on the conceptual “zero-sum” draft on Friday in […] Continue reading ->
Deadlock may once again be the name of the game at the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights—TRIPS, for short. A communication from Switzerland and Mexico questioning the need to extend the waiver on intellectual property rights on COVID-19 vaccines to therapeutics and diagnostics is laying bare the divergences […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged governments worldwide to step up the supervision of vaccine manufacture and distribution, especially when public funding is used in vaccine R&D or manufacture, so as to prioritise essential vaccines and ensure they are distributed equitably.  The global health agency’s call to governments came as it released its annual […] Continue reading ->