COVID-19

The 78th World Health Assembly opened on Monday with a broad appeal to global solidarity, as delegates from around the world gather in Geneva to confront mounting health, climate, and financial challenges – and finalise a global treaty to head off the next pandemic.

As world leaders meet in Geneva to negotiate a new UN-brokered agreement on pandemic preparedness, we revisit frontline doctors, community advocates, a youth volunteer and a journalist who lived through the storm of COVID-19. Their voices are just a few among millions that show why this moment matters.

Children in many of the world’s wealthiest countries saw marked declines in their academic performance, mental wellbeing, and physical health as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new report published by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Wednesday.

In the early hours of Wednesday morning in Geneva, countries finalised a draft global agreement aimed at improving how the world prepares for and responds to pandemics, marking a historic step that will be submitted to the World Health Assembly in May for adoption.

The World Health Organization (WHO) this week reflected on COVID-19, and ongoing efforts to understand the disease, five years after its emergence.

Our “collective amnesia” about how bad the COVID-19 pandemic was should not prevent us from protecting ourselves and our loved ones from the ongoing spread of respiratory diseases as the northern hemisphere prepares for winter, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday.

Escalating hostilities in Deir-ez-Zor in eastern Syria is impacting civilians and the infrastructure they rely on, the UN humanitarian affairs office, OCHA, said on Thursday, expressing deep concern over the situation.