The director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Ghebreysus, defended this Monday that the Covid-19 pandemic showed that this body needs to be stronger and better financed.
Before health ministers from more than a hundred countries, who met in person for the first time since 2019, at the organization’s annual meeting, Tedros analyzed the achievements of the WHO in its first five-year period, presenting the objectives for the second, which will begin with his re-election as CEOOn tuesday.
“The world needs a stronger, more empowered and better funded WHO”, Ghebreysus, noting that in recent years “there have been numerous calls to change the organization”.
A new operating model is needed, one that turns a fragmented organization into a more integrated and agile one”, clarified the head of the WHO, adding that the Covid-19 pandemic has put the path of transformation to the test.
Tedros Ghebreysus enunciated several advances in global health in recent years, such as advances in the fight against tobacco, alcohol or sugary drinkssince two thirds of the member countries introduced taxes on some of these products or increased the existing ones.
The number of workers in the health area has also increased globally by 29% since 2013, although it is estimated that 15 million professionals are still lacking, the WHO official stressed.
Tedros Ghebreysus cited as one of the great achievements of the last five years the fact that the world has provided a malaria vaccine for the first timewhich has been inoculated into more than a million children in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi.
The response to the growing threat of microbial resistance to antibiotics has increased, tripling the number of countries that share and analyze information on what is one of the main health problems for the future, added the WHO director general.
On the eve of the start of his second term, Tedros Ghebreysus cited great challenges to face, such as the physical and sexual violence suffered by a third of women in the world, or the increase in psychological problems, with an increase of 28% in cases of depression and 26% of anxiety, during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Source: Observadora
