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 ->
The United States, once a reluctant partner in the initiative for a new global pandemic accord, is now keen to move ahead in negotiations over an agreement. The accord would expedite more rapid global data sharing and response to looming threats as well as ensuring greater equity in access to medicines and treatments, said the […] 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 ->
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 ->
The SARS-CoV2 virus just won’t give up. As the northern hemisphere heads into its third pandemic winter, experts say the continued evolution of Omicron’s sub-variants indicates a fresh wave is coming, but no one knows which variant will fuel it. Scientists have catalogued 390 Omicron lineages and 48 recombinants of the virus – which occur […] Continue reading ->