The US has consolidated its efforts to address global health threats into a single structure, the Bureau of Global Heath Security and Diplomacy, which was launched on Monday. Renowned Cameroonian health expert Dr John Nkengasong, appointed last year to lead the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), leads the new structure and will […] Continue reading ->
Thirty-seven countries have received grants worth $338 million from the Pandemic Fund to boost their resilience to pandemics in the first round of the fund’s disbursements. Three disbursements involve multi-country grants: to 12 Caribbean countries to strengthen their early warning surveillance, build laboratory systems and workforce development; to seven Latin American countries to engage communities […] Continue reading ->
The final reading of the Political Declaration for the United Nations High-Level Meeting on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response (PPPR) is scheduled for Tuesday in New York – and while the revised text has a few more practical clauses than the bland zero-draft, it remains more aspirational than actionable. The draft Political Declaration, which has […] Continue reading ->
With the fate and nature of the pandemic accord currently being negotiated by World Health Organization (WHO) member states still uncertain, global health experts are calling for “realistic” backup plans to protect the world against the next pandemic. “We need an ambitious but implementable pandemic accord – that is the Holy Grail,” Javier Guzman, Director […] Continue reading ->
With the sixth meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) meeting to develop a  pandemic accord currently underway in Geneva, the World Health Organization (WHO) chief minced no words when he slammed “groups with vested interests” for trying to sabotage the negotiations. “Twenty years ago, the tobacco industry tried to undermine negotiations on the WHO […] Continue reading ->