Countries keep increasing their military budgets yet seem unwilling to prepare for an “invisible enemy” – a pandemic-causing pathogen that can be more damaging than a war, World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyessus warned at the start of the final negotiations for a pandemic agreement on Monday. The COVID-19 pandemic killed up […] Continue reading ->
World Health Organization (WHO) member states have entered their final week of scheduled negotiations on the pandemic agreement (PA), amid renewed urgency following the United States withdrawal from the organization and widespread aid cuts that carry serious implications for global health. With limited time before the May World Health Assembly, when a final version of […] Continue reading ->
On the eve of the final round of pandemic agreement negotiations ahead of the World Health Assembly (WHA), 30 legal experts have cautioned against using “voluntary” to describe technology transfer. The latest draft of the pandemic agreement (text agreed by end of 21 February) states that technology transfer for the production of pandemic-related health products […] Continue reading ->
Cuts to global immunisation budgets are hitting measles vaccine coverage, disease surveillance, laboratory networks and outbreak response the hardest, according to the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE). SAGE, which advises the World Health Organization (WHO) on immunisation, issued the warning at a media briefing on Tuesday after its four-day biannual meeting. It warned […] Continue reading ->
How can health inequality be reduced? This was the topic of the most recent episode of the Global Health Matters podcast with Dr. Garry Aslanyan. Understanding Health Inequality “Health inequity is produced by and within social relations that govern the production and exchange of concrete material things that we need to survive and flourish, to […] Continue reading ->
Tanzania has extinguished a deadly outbreak of Marburg virus, but elsewhere across Africa, an alarming surge of health crises continue to unfold – including expanding mpox infections in Uganda, a cholera outbreak in Angola and a first-ever cholera case in neighbouring Namibia. The Marburg virus outbreak in Tanzania has officially ended, Tanzanian health authorities declared […] Continue reading ->
Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that 83% of US international aid programs were “canceled” hours before a federal district judge ruled that the administration’s actions were an overreach of the Executive branch’s power. At risk are thousands of lifesaving humanitarian programs. In a refugee camp in Bangladesh, 500,000 Rohynga children depend on food treatment […] Continue reading ->
Encephalitis “remains under-recognized, under-diagnosed, and underfunded”,  according to a new policy report from the World Health Organization (WHO). Climate change, vaccine hesitancy, and the rising burden of vector-borne diseases are also fuelling an increased number of encephalitis cases, a rare but serious inflammation of the brain.  The technical document urges coordinated global action to “confront […] Continue reading ->