Global COVID Summit: Joe Biden urges continued fight against virus and recalls “pandemic is not over”

The president of the United States, Joe Biden, on Thursday inaugurated the second global summit on COVID and urged world leaders to renew their commitment to fight against the virus, threatening that his home country was approaching ‘tragic milestone’ of 1 million deaths for coronavirus.

“This pandemic is not over yet,” Biden declared to begin the summit. “Now we have a tragic milestone here in America: 1 million deaths from COVID, 1 million vacant seats around the family table.” ”.

The mandatory ordered to fly the flags to half the crew and affirmed that the world should not be content with the progress made so far against the pandemic.

The virus has caused more than 999,000 deaths in the United States and at least 6.2 million worldwide since it appeared in late 2019, according to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Biden ordered the half -staff to be held until sunset Monday at honor those who died of the virus.

The need for vaccines against COVID-19 exists dropped in some country then infections and deaths have plummeted around the world in recent months, not least because Omicron has proven to be less severe than previous variants of the virus.

For the first time since its inception, UN-supported COVAX funding has “sufficient doses for countries to meet their vaccination targets,” according to Drs. Seth Berkley, CEO of the Gavi vaccine alliance, who heads COVAX.

However, even More than 65% of the world’s population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, less than 16% of people living in poor countries have been vaccinated. Countries are more likely to meet the World Health Organization’s target of vaccinating 70% of the population by June.

In countries such as Cameroon, Uganda and Ivory Coast, it has been difficult for authorities to get enough coolers to deliver vaccines, send enough vials for mass campaigns and get enough health workers to inject. of vaccines.

Experts also point out that more than half of the health workers needed to provide vaccines in the poorest countries are underpaid or not even paid.

Hesitation when it comes to funding

The president asked the US Congress that provide more funding for tests, vaccinations and treatmentsomething that lawmakers have not been able to pass until now.

The lack of funding – Biden asked for an additional $ 22.5 billion that he thinks is important – is a reflection of reluctance at home, and jeopardizes the global response to the pandemic.

Eight months after the first summit, in which he announced the ambitious commitment to donate 1.2 billion vaccines to the world, the sense of urgency for the United States and other countries to respond it is missing.

is reduced drive to distribute vaccines and treatments, while that the most infectious variant is on the rise and millions of people in the world are not vaccinated.

Biden began the virtual summit with a pre-recorded speech in which he said the fight against COVID-19 “should remain an international priority.” The summit is hosted by the United States, Germany, Indonesia, Senegal and Belize.

“This summit is a opportunity to renew our efforts and keep our foot on the gas to control this pandemic and prevent future health crises, ” Biden said.

Efforts to prevent future pandemics

Throughout the meeting, presidents and Prime Ministers from various countries spoke, including Iván Duque (Colombia), Jacinda Ardern (New Zealand), Mario Draghi (Italy) and Fumio Kishida (Japan), as well as experts to health and other officials.

While they all highlighted the achievements to date and reviewed the contributions made by each country to fight the pandemic, the common feature of all their presentations was the emphasis on the need to continue to help countries with the lowest vaccination rates and strengthen global health responses to prevent a new event of this kind.

“We must strengthen the architecture of the global health system to offer responses in the face of a future pandemic,” Japanese Prime Minister Kishida said in his presentation, proposing reform to WHO and adding more more funds to the World Bank for that purpose.

The United States, in part, has pledged to increase its initial contribution to the creation of a new global fund for health security and pandemic preparedness to the World Bank by an additional $ 200 million, bringing the total commitment will be $ 450 million.

Source: AP