WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebryesus urged a ‘wait and see’ attitude Tuesday in his first public comments on US President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Robert F Kennedy Jr as Secretary of Health and Human Services – despite a flurry of fresh criticism by 77 Nobel Laureates over the controversial appointment. “It’s a transition […] Continue reading ->
“Much stronger surveillance” of deadly H5N1 and other avian influenza strains in both domestic and wild animals is needed both in The United States as well as globally so as to head off pandemic risks from variants that could mutate to infect humans more directly.  A senior World Health Organization official, Dr Maria Van Kerkkove, […] Continue reading ->
With plans underway for a new “Independent Panel” on Antimicrobial Resistance, endorsed at September’s UN High-Level AMR Meeting, the new body must become a strong scientific authority. It should have the power to “challenge” the agencies that create it and address both human and animal health factors driving drug-resistant pathogens. That was a key message […] Continue reading ->
WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus appealed to Israel to reverse this week’s decision by the country’s Knesset, or parliament, to close the Jerusalem-based operations of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), saying that “there is simply no other alternative to UNRWA.”  Tedros also said that the third phase […] Continue reading ->
The final phase of a planned polio campaign in northern Gaza has been postponed due to escalating violence in the area, the World Health Organization announced on Wednesday. “Due to the escalating violence, intense bombardment, mass displacement orders, and lack of assured humanitarian pauses across most of northern Gaza, the Polio Technical Committee for Gaza… […] Continue reading ->