Following a first-ever outbreak of deadly Marburg virus disease in Equatorial Guinea, the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday called an emergency meeting of the Marburg virus vaccine consortium (MARVAC) to receive an urgent update on possible vaccine candidates for the filovirus that can have an 80% fatality rate.   At the meeting, the agency received […] Continue reading ->
A new 10-point proposal by the World Health Organization’s Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus for improving preparedness and response to health emergencies received mixed reviews from WHO member states in Monday’s opening session of this week’s Executive Board (EB) meeting, the agency’s 34-member governing body.  It was the first substantive issue to be tackled […] Continue reading ->
The first three weeks of 2023 were encouraging for the African continent’s fight against COVID-19. With cases down 97% year-on-year since the same period in 2022, hospitalizations for severe illness and deaths from the virus decreased significantly, the World Health Organization’s African Regional Office said. “For the first time since COVID-19 shook our lives, January […] Continue reading ->
Proposed amendments to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Health Regulations (IHR) focus on improving accountability and compliance, according to Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Speaking at the start of last week’s meeting of the IHR review committee, Tedros said that he expected a report from the committee, which is considering the amendments, by […] Continue reading ->
As nations clamp down on travellers from China during an Omicron surge there Chinese health experts have told the World Health Organization that two known Omicron lineages are dominating the current Chinese surge, with BA.5.2 and BF.7 together accounting for 97.5% of all locally-acquired infections.  The data was contained in a report by WHO’s Technical Advisory […] Continue reading ->
This month, world leaders gathered in Montreal for a major UN conference on biodiversity, aiming to reach an agreement on how to stop species loss. The Fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) – COP15 for short–  has drawn tens of thousands of people. Delayed several times, it is the first […] Continue reading ->