admin Countries have agreed to amend the International Health Regulations which were adopted in the year 2005 such as by defining a “pandemic emergency” and providing a helping hand to the developing countries in order to gain better access to financing and medical supplies according to WHO.
Geneva: The World Health Organisation says that the member countries on Saturday have accepted a series of new steps to enhance global preparedness for and response to pandemics like COVID-19 and mpox.
Countries have now agreed to implement the amends – the International Health Regulations which were adopted in 2005.
The agreement was received as the U.N. agency concluded its six-day World Health Assembly in 2024, after they had planned to adopt more sweeping pandemic “treaty” at the meeting was shelved greatly over conflicts of opinions between developing countries and developed countries about the enhanced sharing of technology and the pathogens which lead to the pandemics.
But the countries have agreed to accept the negotiations on the pandemic accord within the year, “at the latest,” WHO said.
A public health law professional at Georgetown University, Lawrence Gostin, acclaimed a “big win for health security,” and posted it on the social media platform, X, that the move “will simplify negotiations for the pandemic agreement.”
WHO has said that countries have defined a pandemic emergency as a communicable disease that has a “wide geographical spread” and has exceeded or will exceed the ability of national health systems to respond.
It is also claimed as an outbreak that has or will cause “substantial” economic or social disturbance and is in need of immediate international action.
Yuanqiong Hu, who is a senior legal and policy adviser at the Doctors Without Borders has expressed that these alterations which were adopted this Saturday, include “important provisions addressing equity in access to health products during global health emergencies.”
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