Experts were closely watching the development of Japan’s COVID-19 outbreak for signs of whether the virus might escape further out of control, moving closer to the tipping point of a pandemic – the worldwide spread of a new disease. Meanwhile, a new study in The Lancet found that in Africa, Egypt, Algeria and South Africa […] Continue reading ->
Ecological degradation, climate change, and exploitative marketing practices are the greatest emerging threats to children’s health, says a new report from a WHO-UNICEF-Lancet Commission on the future of child health. Despite dramatic improvements in survival, education and nutrition for children over the past five decades, the report, titled A Future for the World’s Children?, found […] Continue reading ->
Amidst reports of an even tougher crackdown in China, including door to door visits by Wuhan public health authorities to identify people infected with the novel COVID-19 coronavirus and place them in mass quarantine facilities, WHO’s Emergencies Head Mike Ryan defended the tough government measures at a press briefing on Tuesday. “Door to door surveillance, […] Continue reading ->
The rise in new cases of COVID-19 seemed to be slowing in mainland China, but concerns remain about local transmission in cities abroad such as Hong Kong, Singapore, and Japan, and on cruise ships. China has confirmed 70644 cases and 1772 deaths as of 5 p.m. Central European Time, representing an increase of 2060 cases […] Continue reading ->
The International Health Regulations are in need of reform, experts say – to create a more nuanced system of alerting the public about international health emergencies that goes beyond the existing yes-no decision, and to improve compliance to IHR laws by member states during such outbreaks. A high level panel of experts reviewed key concerns […] Continue reading ->
SINGAPORE – Last Saturday, a day after Singapore raised its disease outbreak response alert for COVID-19 from yellow to orange as the first cases of local transmission of the virus were confirmed, supermarkets found themselves besieged by customers piling carts full of instant noodles, rice and toilet paper, among other essentials. “As there are now […] Continue reading ->
Egypt confirmed its first COVID-19 case on Friday, the first on the African continent, Egyptian media said, a report also confirmed by the World Health Organization’s Egypt office in a tweet. A Health Ministry statement said that it had informed WHO of the infection in a foreign national, who had been tested and then placed […] Continue reading ->
After two days of more hopeful signs that new cases of the novel coronavirus in China might be stabilizing, a sharp increase of 14,840 new COVID-19 infections was reported Thursday by the Province of Hubei, more than 10 times the previous day. Meanwhile, Vietnamese authorities had reportedly imposed a mass quarantine on a number of […] Continue reading ->
The novel coronavirus has been officially named by the World Health Organization as COVID-19, in the first day of a global consultation with about 400 researchers and public health experts charged with designing a coherent way forward to confront the expanding epidemic. However, as the case count rose by Tuesday afternoon to 42,747 people with […] Continue reading ->
“We all have a vested interest to stop this epidemic,” says Thomas Cueni, Director General of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA). As WHO on Tuesday convenes a Global Research & Innovation Forum to rapidly ramp up R&D, Cueni spoke with Health Policy Watch about what he describes as “the extraordinary willingness […] Continue reading ->