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WHO Expert Panel Formulates
Recommendations To Curb Current Pandemic And Avert A Future Pandemic
Catastrophe
The WHO’s Independent
Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response issued two sets of
recommendations in May designed 1) to lessen the impact of the current
COVID-19 pandemic and 2) to create a truly international system that
can effectively prevent any future outbreaks from escalating into
pandemics. The panel of 11 experts, described
as highly
experienced, skilled, and diverse,
worked for eight months to provide a definitive account of what
happened and why it happened and analyzed how a future pandemic can be
prevented. To read an account of the panel’s diagnosis of how the
world allowed the current pandemic to unfold, see the related article
in this issue.
To curtail the
current pandemic, the panel calls for:
1. One billion vaccine
doses from high income countries to low to middle income countries by
September of this year and another billion doses by mid-2022.
2. Vaccine producing
countries should agree to voluntary licensing and technology transfer
for COVID-19 vaccines.
3. G7 countries should
commit to provide 60% of the US$19 billion required for The Access to
COVID-19 Tools Accelerator (ACT-A) collaboration in 2021 for vaccines,
therapeutics, and diagnostics.
4. Every country
should apply non-pharmaceutical public health measures systematically
and rigorously.
5. WHO should develop
a plan with clear goals, targets, and milestones to guide and monitor
bringing the COVID-19 pandemic to an end.
To prevent a future
pandemic and create a new international system, the Independent Panel
crafted the following recommendations. Each of these recommendations
is tied to the evidence the panel found for the failings in response
to the current pandemic. The new recommendations should be implemented
as a package to assure they create the new system needed.
According to its
report, the Panel “has assessed the set of recommendations against one
criterion only: if they had been in place, would they have stopped the
COVID-19 pandemic? We believe the answer is yes, and therefore urge
their implementation as a whole and in a timely manner.”
1. Elevate pandemic
preparedness and response to the highest level of political
leadership.
The idea behind this
recommendation is to gain the attention of the leaders of each country
and get them to commit to transforming pandemic preparedness and
response from its current inadequate to a future adequate level. The
recommendation calls for the creation of a Council of Leaders which
would adopt a political declaration at a special session of the UN
General Assembly in 2021.
2. Strengthen the independence, authority, and
financing of WHO.
3. Invest in preparedness now to prevent the next
crisis
This the panel seeks to accomplish in part by having all national
governments update their pandemic preparedness plans and have them
peer reviewed at regular intervals.
4. Create a new agile and rapid surveillance
information and alert system.
5. Establish a pre-negotiated platform for tools and
supplies.
6. Raise new international financing for pandemic
preparedness and response.
7. National pandemic coordinators should have a direct
line to Head of State or Government
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