Geneva: The top world health body on Monday urged countries to work together to bring the acute phase of the pandemic to an end, underscoring the tools available to do so.
WHO Chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a press conference alongside Germany’s development minister Svenja Schulze pointed the world was entering into the third year of the pandemic which is ‘critical juncture’.”We must work together to bring the acute phase of this pandemic to an end. We cannot let it continue to drag on, lurching between panic and neglect, he said.”
Enlisting the heroes of pandemic, Tedros flagged Germany as the largest donor for the world health agency. Meanwhile, the United States has made the biggest financial contribution among member states to the organisation.
Germany, this year taking over the G7 Presidency prioritized its attempts to end the pandemic, for which it called for a “massively accelerated, truly global vaccination campaign”. Coming up this week would be WHO Executive Board meetings where key aspects of the U.N. health agency’s future are due to be discussed, including Tedros’ bid for a second term and a proposal to make the agency more financially independent.
On Sunday, replying to a query on why are people ending up in the hospital and dying from it if the Omicron variant is less severe, the WHO Covid-19 technical head Maria Van Kerkhove said, ‘People who are infected with Omicron have the full spectrum of disease, everything from asymptomatic infection all the way through severe disease and death’.