Merck will appeal the recommendation by the Europe Union’s (EU) Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) that the European Medicines Agency (EMA) rejects its COVID-19 antiviral, Lagevrio (molnupiravir). The decision comes after months of deliberation by European regulators, who began looking at Lagevrio, in November 2021. The CHMP said there was a lack […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization (WHO) has reiterated its firm recommendation that wearing masks is an effective method to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in a media briefing on Wednesday. Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead for COVID-19, said that coronavirus is still in circulation and wearing appropriate face masks is one of the ways […] Continue reading ->
New research published in The Lancet suggests that individuals who have previously been infected with COVID-19 have an 88% lower risk of hospitalization or death than those who have not. The study is the most comprehensive review of data on natural immunity to date, covering data from 65 studies across 19 countries published since January […] Continue reading ->
Nine months after John Nkengasong left Africa CDC to head PEPFAR, the African Union has now elected a Director General for the continent’s leading public health institution who has the task of finding new ways to engage continental and global leaders in Africa’s public health challenges in the post-COVID era. A new Director-General has been […] Continue reading ->
A senior World Health Organization (WHO) official has emphatically denied that abandoned its investigation of the origins of the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. The comment by Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, COVID-19 technical lead, was in response to a report published on Tuesday by Nature which stated that the agency has “quietly shelved” its […] Continue reading ->
A new study found COVID-19 has emerged as a leading cause of death in children and young people in the US, ranking eighth overall between August 2021 and July 2022. The Oxford University study determined that COVID-19 was the underlying cause of death for more than 940,000 people in the US, including over 1,300 deaths […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization’s Emergency Committee on the COVID-19 pandemic was meeting Friday evening – with mixed signals emerging about whether the expert advisory group would recommend that the global health agency end the state of international public health emergency over the virus whose emergence stunned the world a little more than three years ago. […] Continue reading ->
Most Africans could not get a COVID-19 test unless they were hospitalised or could afford to pay a private laboratory for a pricey test – yet rapid tests were being dished out free in the US and Europe. High prices, slow regulatory approval, and outdated ideas about self-testing were some of the barriers that prevented […] Continue reading ->
While the World Health Organization’s (WHO) emergency committee on COVID-19 will decide this week whether the virus still constitutes a global health emergency, the body’s Director-General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, is “very concerned” about the pandemic. “While I will not pre-empt the advice of the emergency committee, I remain very concerned by the situation in […] Continue reading ->
The new Brazilian government under President Lula da Silva intends to propose that the World Health Organization (WHO) addresses the health of indigenous people systematically, including by training indigenous health workers. Santiago Alcazar, the former head of WHO in Brazil, told a discussion convened by the Geneva Global Health Hub (G2H2) on Monday that Brazil […] Continue reading ->