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| No images? Click here POST PRESSER LINKS Note for journalists: Below are remarks from today's briefing, with additional linksWHO Director-General's opening remarks at 26 April media briefingGood morning, good afternoon and good evening. First to Sudan. The bloodshed we have seen over the past 10 days in Sudan is heartbreaking, in a country whose people have already suffered so much in recent years. WHO welcomes the ceasefire agreed between the parties. We urge all parties to fully respect it. Already, the violence has taken a terrible toll on health. On top of the number of deaths and injuries caused by the conflict itself, WHO expects there will be many more deaths due to outbreaks, lack of access to food and water, and disruptions to essential health services, including immunization. WHO estimates that one quarter of the lives lost so far could have been saved with access to basic haemorrhage control. But paramedics, nurses and doctors are unable to access injured civilians, and civilians are unable to access services. In the capital Khartoum, 61% of health facilities are closed, and only 16% are operating as normal. Many patients with chronic diseases, like kidney disease, diabetes and cancer, are unable to access the health facilities or medicines they need. In the coming weeks, an estimated 24,000 women will give birth, but they are currently unable to access maternal care. Vector control programmes to prevent transmission of dengue and malaria have had to stop; The risk of diarrhoeal diseases is high as the water supply is disrupted and people are drinking river water to survive; With nutrition programmes suspended, 50,000 children are at real risk; And the movement of civilians seeking safety threatens the fragile health system throughout the country. Since the conflict began, WHO has verified 16 attacks on health, causing 8 deaths. WHO is also concerned about the occupation of the central public health laboratory by one of the parties in the conflict. Technicians no longer have access to the laboratory, which means the lab is no longer able to perform its normal diagnostic and reference function. We are also concerned that those occupying the lab could be accidentally exposed to pathogens stored there. WHO is seeking more information and conducting a risk assessment. Power cuts are also threatening to make the few remaining stocks of blood stored in the Central Blood Bank unusable. WHO staff are risking their lives to support the urgent health needs. We are relocating our staff and their dependents to safety, but we are making plans to continue our operations to the best of our ability. WHO has stocks of essential medicines, blood bags, supplies for surgery and trauma care waiting for delivery. But we need safe access to do that. As always, the best medicine in this situation is peace. === Now to the COVID-19 pandemic. In February 2020, just weeks after the first reported cases of COVID-19, WHO published our first Strategic Preparedness and Response Plan – the SPRP – outlining the steps countries needed to take to prepare for, and respond to, this new virus. Next week we will publish our fourth SPRP, which is designed to guide countries over the next two years to transition from an emergency response to long-term, sustained management of COVID-19. We’re very encouraged by the sustained decline in reported deaths from COVID-19, which have dropped 95% since the beginning of this year. However, some countries are seeing increases, and over the past four weeks, 14,000 people lost their lives to this disease. An estimated one in 10 infections results in post-COVID-19 condition, suggesting that hundreds of millions of people will need longer-term care. And, as the emergence of the new XBB.1.16 variant illustrates, the virus is still changing, and is still capable of causing new waves of disease and death. We remain hopeful that sometime this year, we will be able to declare an end to COVID-19 as a public health emergency of international concern. But this virus is here to stay, and all countries will need to learn to manage it alongside other infectious diseases. The new SPRP will support countries to make that transition. Even as we support countries to respond to COVID-19, we’re also working to keep the world safer against future epidemics and pandemics. Today, WHO launched the Preparedness and Resilience for Emerging Threats Initiative, or PRET. The acronym is deliberate: “prêt” means “ready” in French. Rather than focusing on specific pathogens or diseases, PRET takes an integrated approach to pandemic planning, by focussing on groups of pathogens and the systems they affect. To begin with, PRET will focus on respiratory pathogens, including influenza, coronaviruses, RSV, and as-yet-unknown pathogens. Pandemics are by definition global events, so PRET is designed to promote collaboration between countries. But it’s also designed to promote collaboration between sectors. As COVID-19 demonstrated, a pandemic is not just a health crisis. It affects economies, education, trade, travel, food supply systems and more. PRET will therefore support countries to engage as many sectors as possible, as well as civil society groups, religious communities and young people. This integrated approach will help countries to review, test, and update their pandemic planning efforts to ensure they have the right capacities and capabilities in place. === The COVID-19 pandemic was a powerful demonstration of the lifesaving power of vaccines. This week marks World Immunization Week. Although vaccines have played a key role in helping to curb COVID-19, the pandemic severely disrupted routine immunization programmes around the world. Over the course of the pandemic, essential immunization levels fell in more than 100 countries, leading to rising outbreaks of measles, diphtheria, polio and yellow fever. Between 2019 and 2021, an estimated 67 million children missed out on at least one essential immunization, including 48 million children who missed out entirely. This dramatic reversal follows almost a decade of stalled progress, and has set back vaccination rates to levels not seen since 2008. In response, WHO and our partners have launched “The Big Catch-up”, a global effort to boost vaccination levels in children to at least pre-pandemic levels. The Big Catch-up will have a particular focus on 20 countries around the world in which three-quarters of the children who missed out on vaccination in 2021 live. But all countries, rich and poor, have work to do in addressing the barriers to immunization, whether it’s access, availability, cost or disinformation. === Finally, yesterday marked World Malaria Day. Incredible progress has been made against malaria over the last two decades. Advances in nets, tests and medicines have helped prevent more than 2 billion cases and save an estimated 12 million lives. The world’s first malaria vaccine has so far reached 1.5 million children in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, and a second malaria vaccine is now in development. These innovations have been made possible by investment in cutting edge research and development. But even with all of these advances, malaria remains a leading cause of death for people in low-income countries, and still claims more than 600,000 lives each year, disproportionately affecting poor and marginalized populations. At a time when more investment is needed, the global malaria response faces significant shortfalls. World Malaria Day is a reminder of the urgent need to close investment gaps, scale up research and development, and expand access to malaria tools and services for the most at-risk populations. By using all the tools we have, old and new, we can move closer to the vision of “zero malaria”. Fadéla, back to you. LINK: WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the media briefing – 26 April 2023 Video from today's briefing: Full files Link: https://who.canto.global/b/P8JHK News edit link: https://who.canto.global/b/GEOP4 Source: WHO Audio: https://who.canto.global/b/RJ1O7 or on web: https://terrance.who.int/mediacentre/presser/WHO-AUDIO_Emergencies_Press_Conference_26APR2023.mp3 Related links: Sudan: Country page: WHO EMRO | Sudan | Countries World Immunization Week 2023 (who.int) PRET: WHO launches new initiative to improve pandemic preparedness Malaria: WHO urges increased implementation of recommended tools to combat malaria Photos for media (media should register via this link by clicking on "media registration" Media contacts: You are receiving this NO-REPLY email because you are included on a WHO mail list.
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