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‘Epidemics are a reality,’ says Tedros
The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, warned on Saturday that the coronavirus crisis will not be the last pandemic.
In a video message marking the first International Epidemic Preparedness Day on Sunday, Tedros said that all countries must invest in preparedness capabilities to prevent, detect and mitigate emergencies of all kinds because “history tells us this will not be the last pandemic, and epidemics are a fact of life. “
“Strong primary health care is especially important as the foundation for universal health coverage,” he said, adding that “true preparation” requires a “whole-of-government and whole-of-society approach.”
Efforts ‘are doomed’
There are currently 80,182,793 coronavirus infections with 1,755,141 deaths worldwide, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University.
The United Nations General Assembly called for a day to mark an epidemic preparedness day to promote the importance of prevention and partnership to overcome epidemics.
“For too long, the world has operated in a cycle of panic and neglect … We throw money at one outbreak, and when it ends, we forget it and do nothing to prevent the next,” Tedros said, adding that current mechanisms they are “dangerously myopic and downright difficult to understand.”
He also said that the pandemic has “highlighted the intimate link between the health of humans, animals and the planet,” and warned that climate change is making Earth less habitable.
“Any effort to improve human health is doomed” without fighting climate change, Tedros stressed.
A few months before the coronavirus broke out, the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board released its first annual report on global preparedness for health emergencies and said the world was not equipped for potentially devastating pandemics.
The first September 2019 annual report from the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board on global preparedness for health emergencies, released a few months before COVID-19 broke out, said the planet was not very prepared for potentially devastating pandemics.
Author: Melissa Sou-Jie Van Brunnersum
