The World Health Assembly chooses a new chief for the World Health Organization in May 2027. Before judging the candidates, assess the predecessors. Eight people have held the post over 78 years. Their varied track record offers pointers for selecting the future incumbent. Every five years, WHO rediscovers that its Director-Generalship is a political office […] Continue reading ->
ISRAELI-OCCUPIED WEST BANK – The oxygen mask slipped from three-month-old Ahmad Zaid’s face. He was in his father’s arms, in front of a closed Israeli military gate blocking the road between Deir Ammar refugee camp, northwest of Ramallah, where the family lives, and the city of Ramallah, with a hospital the family was desperate to […] Continue reading ->
KATHMANDU – Shekhar Lamichhane is grieving even as he struggles to breathe. The 65-year-old asthma patient needs oxygen support. Some of his family members, including siblings, were swept away in Nepal’s flash flood on 26 August when glacial ice and rock slammed into the valley below near the Nepal–China border. “I am on oxygen support. […] Continue reading ->
Around 200,000 people in the Israeli-occupied West Bank will lose access to vital food aid from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) due to funding cuts, exacerbating food insecurity. In the Gaza Strip, the nutrition and health crisis is set to worsen further due to a lack of medical supplies and sanitation, the World […] Continue reading ->
Nearly a year after Israel and Hamas agreed to a US-brokered cease-fire, some 94% of Gaza’s 2.1 million Palestinian residents lack adequate shelters with 84% facing severe constraints in heating, cooling, cooking, lighting and hygiene and nearly 60% facing “critical” or “catastrophic” shelter needs. This according to a new analysis by the Global Shelter Cluster, […] Continue reading ->
Treatment tents are burning in Ituri, burial teams are facing hostility, and suspected patients are fleeing quarantine centres, disappearing into communities. These heartbreaking incidents are often described as obstacles to controlling the current Ebola outbreak. For the dedicated frontline workers risking their lives every day to contain the virus, these challenges are deeply frustrating. But […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization’s estimate of the number of suspected, but as yet unconfirmed, cases of the deadly Ebola Bundibugyo virus has sharply declined from over 1000 a week ago to just 116 today, WHO on Wednesday. That doesn’t mean that the tide has yet turned on the outbreak. But WHO officials sounded notes of […] Continue reading ->
WHO emergency funds are running low, and global health leaders are concerned about a systemic paralysis in pandemic preparedness. In high-level discussions in Geneva, experts explored the geopolitical rifts, pitting the Global South’s demand to treat pandemic tools as legally binding “public goods” against a European push for market-driven surge financing. As a severe Ebola […] Continue reading ->
Sweeping personnel cuts and a massive emergency funding shortfall trigger sharp warnings about acute WHO operational risks from member states and experts. Yet, diverging regional priorities complicate short-term and sustainable financing solutions. GENEVA –Member states sounded alarms over severe WHO budget constraints on Thursday at the World Health Assembly. Delegates warned that a 9.4% staff […] Continue reading ->
GENEVA — The Ebola outbreak unfolding in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Uganda poses a “low” risk globally, according to an expert committee of the World Health Organization (WHO). However, the national and regional risk is “high”, according to the International Health Regulations (IHR) Emergency Committee. Last Sunday, WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom […] Continue reading ->