Parental preferences for rotavirus vaccination for their children under 5 years old in China: A discrete choice experiment.

Rotavirus vaccination is the most effective means to prevent rotavirus gastroenteritis, but its coverage in China is not ideal. We aimed to explore parental preferences for rotavirus vaccination for their children under 5years old to improve vaccination coverage. A Discrete Choice Experiment was conducted online on 415 parents with at least one child under 5years old in 3 cities. Five attributes including vaccine effectiveness, protection duration, risk of mild side-effects, out-of-pocket costs, and time required for vaccination were identified. Each attribute was set at three levels. Mixed-logit models were used to measure parental preferences and the relative importance of vaccine attributes. The optimal vaccination strategy was also explored. 359 samples were included in the analysis. The impacts of the vaccine attribute levels on vaccine choice were all statistically significant (p < .01), except for 1-hour vaccination time. The risk of mild side-effects was the most important factor influencing vaccination. The time required for vaccination was the least important attribute. The largest increase in vaccination uptake (74.45%) occurred with decreased the vaccine risk of mild side-effects from 1/10 to 1/50. The predicted vaccination uptake of the optimal vaccination scenario was 91.79%. When deciding about vaccination, parents preferred the rotavirus vaccination with lower risk of mild side-effects, higher effectiveness, longer protection duration, 2-hour vaccination time and lower cost. The authorities should support enterprises to develop vaccines with lower side-effects, higher effectiveness and longer protection duration in the future. We call for appropriate government subsidies for the rotavirus vaccine.

COVID-19 impact on infant and adolescent vaccine supplies.

Vaccine production is quadrupling rapidly, creating supply chain challenges.

Gender and intersectional analysis of livestock vaccine value chains in Kaffrine, Senegal.

Among livestock species, poultry and small ruminants are of particular importance to rural women in low- and middle-income countries, as means to generate income, provide nutritious food for the family, accumulate wealth, and confer social status. Newcastle disease (ND) and Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR) are widespread livestock diseases of poultry and small ruminants, respectively. While both diseases are vaccine preventable, numerous constraints limit the availability of and access to livestock vaccines, especially among the most vulnerable populations in developing countries. The literature on equity and effectiveness of livestock vaccine distribution systems has emphasized many of these constraints, however a gendered analysis and deeper understanding of the vaccine system remain insufficient. This paper applies a gendered and intersectional transformational approach, or GITA, to highlight how gender and other social factors affect the provision and utilization of vaccines for ND and PPR diseases in the region of Kaffrine, Senegal. We first articulate and describe the vaccine value chains (VVCs) for these diseases in Kaffrine, and then analyze the gendered and intersectional dynamics at different nodes of the VVCs, including actors at the national level, through the regional and district levels, down to providers of animal health at community level and the livestock keepers themselves. Our findings indicate that actors' various experiences are shaped and defined mainly by rigid gender norms, location and remoteness, and to a lesser degree by other social stratifications of age, ethnicity, and livelihood. Given the significant role that gender norms play in the livestock vaccine value chains, differences according to the livestock species, regulation of vaccine administration, and vaccine distribution systems emerge as highly relevant for understanding barriers that women specifically face within the livestock vaccination system.

Butantan inicia a produção de mais 5 milhões de doses da Coronavac

Saiba mais em www.vacinaja.sp.gov.br

Vacinação dos profissionais do transporte

Saiba mais em www.vacinaja.sp.gov.br

Vacinação para grupos especiais

Saiba mais em www.vacinaja.sp.gov.br

Butantan recebe 3 mil litros de insumos para fabricação da vacina

Saiba mais em www.vacinaja.sp.gov.br

Minitaller sobre la aceptación y el uso de las vacunas en el contexto de la seguridad de las mismas

Entender cómo piensa, se posiciona y actúa la gente sobre la vacunación es fundamental para informar el desarrollo de estrategias para la aceptación y el uso de las vacunas. La generación y el uso de datos sobre los factores sociales y de comportamiento implicados requiere un conjunto de herramientas -encuestas, guías de entrevistas, herramientas y marcos relacionados- para apoyar la recopilación y el uso de datos de calidad sobre los factores y las barreras para la aceptación de la vacunación contra el COVID-19. Los programas de inmunización se enfrentan a una serie de retos en el contexto actual de la vacunación contra la COVID-19, incluyendo la preocupación por la seguridad de la vacuna, los retos relacionados con la politización, la equidad y la aplicación de la vacuna, así como la desinformación. La situación es especialmente crítica en lo que respecta a la seguridad de las vacunas, ya que muchos países de América Latina y el Caribe informan de la preocupación del público por la seguridad y la eficacia de las vacunas durante las fases iniciales de su implantación. La escucha social y la recopilación de datos sociales y de comportamiento relacionados con estas preocupaciones reforzarán el diseño, la aplicación y la evaluación por parte de los países de estrategias específicas para generar y mantener la demanda de vacunas, y contribuirán así a aumentar la aceptación de la vacunación contra la COVID-19.

Coletiva de imprensa: anúncios do Governo - 23/04/2021

O Vice-Governador Rodrigo Garcia anunciou nesta sexta-feira (23) o repasse de R$ 33,3 milhões do Governo do Estado para as Prefeituras de São Paulo visando auxiliar em ações de vacinação. “O Governo de São Paulo vai apoiar a vacinação dos municípios do Estado com a destinação de R$ 33,3 milhões, que serão aplicados na compra de insumos e no pagamento das equipes de atendimento de vacinação”, afirmou o Vice-Governador. “Quero aproveitar para agradecer o apoio dos prefeitos, das equipes municipais de vacinação que, junto ao Governo de São Paulo, têm feito a diferença na vacinação da população paulista. Já passamos de mais de dez milhões de doses aplicadas”, completou Rodrigo Garcia. Neste momento, os postos de saúde estão imunizando a população contra a COVID-19 e também contra a gripe, com campanhas simultâneas. Assim, o novo recurso visa auxiliar os municípios a adquirir insumos e reforçar as equipes que atuam no atendimento da população. O valor foi pactuado entre o Governo de São Paulo e os secretários de saúde municipais. “A vacinação da COVID-19 começou dia 17 de janeiro e os municípios, em nenhum momento, pararam de vacinar. Hoje temos uma concomitância, estamos fazendo a vacinação contra a COVID-19 e começamos a vacinação da influenza, o que requer dessas equipes um trabalho ainda maior”, disse Regiane de Paula, Coordenadora Geral do Programa Estadual de Imunização. O Governo de São Paulo anunciou também nesta sexta-feira (23) uma queda de 23,6% no número de mortes por COVID-19 no estado, após oito semanas consecutivas com indicadores em ascensão. A Secretaria de Saúde do Estado também confirmou que os números de internações e de casos confirmados de coronavírus vêm caindo semanalmente desde março. Atualmente, a média diária das mortes em decorrência de casos graves da COVID-19 é de 621 nesta semana epidemiológica, contra 813 no período anterior. “Pela primeira vez após dois meses de alta, o estado de São Paulo apresenta uma queda de 23% no número de óbitos. É a primeira vez que os indicadores de casos, internações e óbitos estão em queda neste período. Graças ao avanço da vacinação, às medidas restritivas do Plano SP e ao apoio da população, o nosso estado está colhendo resultados desse esforço coletivo”, declarou o Vice-Governador e Secretário de Governo Rodrigo Garcia. Desde meados de fevereiro, o número de mortes apontava crescimento semanal, com médias que saltavam em mais de cem óbitos a cada nova semana. Patamares abaixo dessa média começaram a ser constatados a partir da segunda quinzena de março, simultaneamente ao período de vigência da Fase Emergencial do Plano São Paulo. A média de casos também caiu desde a última semana, em 14,3%, passando de de 14.921 para 12.784 infectados. O auge de casos foi verificado três semanas atrás, com 16.453 casos na semana epidemiológica verificada entre os dias 4 e 10 de abril. Já as internações tiveram declínio de 4,5%, baixando de 2.411 para 2.303 nestas duas últimas semanas. Neste caso, a tendência de queda é sustentada desde a última semana de março, que chegou a atingir 3.381 hospitalizações por COVID-19. “Esses dados nos trazem alento, esperança e reforçam que as medidas tomadas pelo Plano São Paulo, fazendo o faseamento vermelho, passando para uma fase mais restritiva – a Fase Emergencial – e agora a Fase de Transição mostram a responsabilidade que o Governo do Estado tem com a saúde e a proteção da vida, assim como a vacinação que vem acontecendo de forma progressiva”, reforçou o Secretário de Saúde Jean Gorinchteyn.

Sesión informativa COVID-19 en las Américas - 21/04/2021

Coletiva de Imprensa OPAS COVID-19 - 04/22/2021 audio Español.

PAHO press briefing on COVID-19 in the Americas - 21/04/2021

PAHO Press Briefing on COVID-19 in the Americas - 04/22/2021 audio English.

Conferencia de prensa de la OPS sobre COVID-19 - 21/04/2021

Conferencia de prensa de la OPS sobre COVID-19/PAHO’s virtual press briefing on COVID-19 audio original.

Press briefing PAHO COVID-19 - 04/21/2021

Press briefing PAHO COVID-19 - 04/22/2021- 04/21/2021 audio French

Coletiva de Imprensa OPAS COVID-19 - 21/04/2021

Coletiva de Imprensa OPAS COVID-19 - 04/22/2021 áudio Português.

Media briefing on COVID-19 and climate change with Dr Tedros and Greta Thunberg - 19/04/2021

0:00:34 CL Hello, good day and welcome to... wherever you are listening to us today from [sic]. It's Monday 19th April 2021. My name is Christian Lindmeier and I'm welcoming you to today's global COVID-19 press conference. The press conference today is on COVID updates with a special focus on the linkages between the climate and the COVID-19 crisis and the role of youth in the response ahead of Earth Day, which is 22nd April, and the first Global Youth Summit organised as part of the global youth mobilisation, which is 23rd to 25th April. Today's press conference will include three special guests and I'm happy to welcome Greta Thunberg, Climate and Environmental Activist, Elahi Rawshan from Bangladesh, volunteer in the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Society, supporting young people in Bangladesh, and Daisy Moran from the USA, Global Youth Mobilisation Youth Board Member and World YMCA Representative. Welcome to the three of you. We will have simultaneous interpretation as usual provided in the six official UN languages, Arabic, Chinese, French, English, Spanish and Russian, plus Portuguese and Hindi. Now let me introduce the participants here in the room. Present in the room are Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General, Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, Technical Lead on COVID-19, Dr Bruce Aylward, Special Advisor to the Director-General and the Lead on the ACT Accelerator. We have Mr Anil Suni, Chief Executive Officer from the WHO Foundation and we have Dr Maria Nera, Director for Health and Environment. We also have joining us remotely today Dr Mike Ryan, Executive Director for the Health Emergencies Programme of WHO, and Dr Mariangela Simao, Assistant Director-General for Access to Medicines and Health Products. With this let me hand over to the Director-General for the introductory remarks. Dr Tedros, the floor is yours. Thank you. Thank you, Christian. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening. Last week new cases of COVID-19 increased for the eighth week in a row with more than 5.2 million cases reported, the most in a single week so far. Deaths rose for the fifth straight week and more than three million deaths have now been reported to WHO. It took nine months to reach one million deaths, four months to reach two million and three months to reach three million deaths. Big numbers can make us numb but each one of these deaths is a tragedy for families, communities and nations. Infections and hospitalisations among people aged 25 to 59 are increasing at an alarming rate, possibly as a result of highly transmissible variants and increased social mixing among younger adults. 00:04:28 Today the emergency committee gave me its advice on vaccines, variants, international travel and other issues. Its full statement is available on our website. We have the tools to bring this pandemic under control in a matter of months if we apply them consistently and equitably. On Friday WHO issued an expression of interest for establishing a COVID-19 technology transfer hub for MRNA vaccines to increase production of those vaccines in low and middle-income countries. We're calling for the original manufacturers of MRNA vaccines to contribute their technology and know-how and for manufacturers in low and middle-income countries to express interest in receiving that technology. We have seen incredible innovation in science. Now we need innovation to ensure as many people as possible benefit from that science. The pandemic will recede but we will still be left with all the other challenges that we had before including the climate crisis. 00:05:58 This week marks Earth Day on 22nd April, a reminder that human health depends on the health of the planet that sustains us. COVID-19 has now killed more than three million people. Air pollution kills more than double that number, seven million people every single year. Despite temporary improvements in air quality last year as a result of so-called lock-downs by September air pollution had returned to pre-pandemic levels. Globally CO2 emissions only decreased by less than 6% last year but by December they had rebounded to their previous levels. The health argument for climate action is crystal-clear. The same unsustainable choices that are killing our planet are killing people. There is no vaccine for climate change but we do have solutions. Last year WHO published our manifesto for a healthy and green recovery, calling on all governments to protect nature, support clean energy sources, develop sustainable food systems and healthier cities and reduce polluting activities. 00:07:36 Together the six prescriptions of the WHO manifesto can not only restore resilient economies; they are a linchpin and essential prerequisite for healthy societies. At the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow this year WHO will deliver a special report with recommendations on how to maximise the health benefits of tackling climate change while avoiding the worst health impacts of the climate crisis. WHO is also spearheading an initiative on promoting climate-resistant health systems in collaboration with the Government of the United Kingdom. Today it's my honour to welcome someone who needs no introduction. Over the past few years Greta Thunberg has become the powerful voice of a young generation demanding climate action. Greta's mobilisation of communities, particularly young people, has been truly inspirational and has brought into sharp focus the impact of the climate crisis on people's lives and the urgent need for transformative action. The awareness she has raised on the links between climate, the environment and health has supported WHO's agenda in these areas, demonstrated the threats all of us face and the role young people can play in building a more sustainable, safer, healthier world. 00:09:33 More recently she has become a powerful advocate for vaccine equity. Tack så mycket, Greta. Today Greta has announced a donation of €100,000 from the Greta Thunberg Foundation to the WHO Foundation in support of COVAX to provide vaccines to people in need. Greta, thank you, tack så mycket for your superb advocacy for climate action and now for vaccine equity. Your contribution makes you the youngest person to contribute to COVAX. Welcome and you have the floor. GT Thank you so much for having me. It is an honour to participate in this event and I will talk briefly now. Science shows that in the future we will most likely experience more frequent and more devastating pandemics unless we drastically change our ways and the way we treat nature. Today up to 75% of all emerging diseases come from animals and as we are cutting down forests and destroying habitats we are creating the ideal conditions for diseases to spill over from one animal to another and then to us. 00:11:08 We can no longer separate the health crisis from the ecological crisis and we cannot separate the ecological crisis from the climate crisis. It's all interlinked in many ways. During this pandemic we have seen what we can achieve when we put resources into science. Vaccines were developed in record time but so far on average one in four people in high-income countries have received a coronavirus vaccine compared with just one in over 500 in low and middle-income countries. The international community, governments and vaccine developers must step up their game and address the tragedy that is vaccine inequity. We have the tools we need to correct this great imbalance that exists around the world today in the fight against COVID-19. Just as with the climate crisis those who are the most vulnerable need to be prioritised and global problems require global solutions. It is completely unethical that high-income countries are now vaccinating young and healthy people if that happens at the expense of people in risk groups and on the front lines in low and middle-income countries. This is a moral test. We talk today about showing solidarity and yet vaccine nationalism is what's running the vaccine distribution. It is only when it really comes down to it that we show our true face and that is why I and many others are supporting WHO, GAVI and all involved in the COVAX initiative, which I believe offers the best path forward to ensure a more equitable global vaccine distribution and a way out of this pandemic. Thank you. 00:13:04 TAG Thank you. Thank you so much, Greta, and thank you for your generosity in donating to the WHO Foundation in support of COVAX. These funds will help us save lives. Around the world young people have been affected by the pandemic in many ways from disruptions in education, loss of employment opportunities, mental health challenges and increased domestic and gender-based violence. WHO is committed to ensuring that the global recovery from COVID-19 includes the voices, energy and ideas of young people. To do that we have partnered with an alliance of the six largest youth development organisations in the world to form the Global Youth Mobilisation, to empower young people to respond to the challenges created by the pandemic in their local communities. 00:14:08 The Global Youth Mobilisation has established a grant mechanism with funds from the Solidarity Response Fund to support innovative local solutions to address the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. From today young people around the world will be able to apply for grants of between 500 and US$5,000 through the Global Youth Mobilisation. These local solutions will be judged and decided on by young people for young people. To mark the starting point for young people to get involved in the Global Youth Mobilisation a Global Youth Summit will be held virtually from this Friday to Sunday, 23rd to 25th April. Over three days thousands of young people, leaders, policymakers and change-makers will come together in one space to discuss the issues facing young people across the world. On behalf of the Big Six youth organisations, the United Nations Foundation and WHO I invite everyone to join us at the Global Youth Summit. Today I'm delighted to be joined by representatives from two of the Big Six organisations. First it's my honour to welcome Elahi Rawshan, a volunteer with the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in Bangladesh. Elahi, thank you for joining us today. You have the floor. 00:16:05 ER Thank you, Dr Tedros, for inviting me here today. I'm really honoured to be here. My name is Elahi Rawshan. I'm a Red Cross/Red Crescent youth volunteer living in Bangladesh. There are about three million young people around the world how have been taking action to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, driving the response efforts and supporting their local communities. I'd like to share with you my story to help explain why recognising, championing and investing in young people through the Global Youth Mobilisation is important. I led the very first disinfection team of Bangladesh Red Crescent Society in different hospitals for two consecutive months. At the beginning of the pandemic here the hospitals needed more supporting hands and we wanted to make sure the hospital environment was safe for everyone and we did to a great extent. One day when the very first COVID patient died in a hospital and everyone was so frightened to go near him, even his own son was reluctant to take his father's body. We went in, we disinfected the room and made sure the body was safe for carrying. 00:17:31 Another day I carried a critical COVID patient on a wheelchair and put an oxygen mask on her when there was no-one around for the support of that person. But I was not the only one; there are thousands of young people in Bangladesh fighting this battle in many different forms. About 4,500 young volunteers of the Red Crescent Society are supporting the vaccination programme every day in Bangladesh. It's mostly the young people here who are making a difference and again it's the young people here who are mostly infected by the pandemic. Many of my friends, colleagues from the different youth organisations and networks have lost their jobs. Almost everyone here is suffering from mental health issues. The data shows that from March 2020 to February 2021 more than 14,000 have committed suicide, which is 45% higher than the previous year and the majority of them are young people. 00:18:44 My dear friends, I have seen localised action making a positive impact on people's lives during this pandemic. I have been trying to collaborate with the Red Crescent Society with my workplace [unclear] who have been offering an online skills programme for the young people. Now as both parties have agreed the Red Crescent youth volunteers will receive a three-month online skills training on different trades like graphics designing, web development, etc. I believe drives like this will help young people individually and at the same time will contribute to the national economy. There are plenty of organisations and individuals out there who are making many more new initiatives to combat this COVID crisis and I would like to invite them all to collaborate with the Global Youth Mobilisation and it will support, promote and invest in your initiatives for improving more lives and communities. Thank you. TAG Thank you. Thank you so much, Elahi. Next it's my pleasure to introduce Daisy Moran, a representative of the World YMCA and a board member of the Global Youth Mobilisation. Daisy, thank you for joining us and you have the floor. 00:20:16 DM Thank you for giving me this opportunity, Dr Tedros, and greetings to you all. I'm Daisy Moran, proud to be with the YMCA in Illinois, USA and proud to be one of the six youth board representatives of the Global Youth Mobilisation. Here's what youth mobilisation has meant for me as the COVID pandemic has significantly increased the inequities in all of our societies. As a young leader I saw a need in my community to offer relief to essential workers who are undocumented immigrants. Through collaboration with fellow young change-makers and organisations we were able to disburse almost $17,000 in relief funds for 38 families. This is just one of thousands of stories that illustrate the simple and powerful fact; when given access and opportunities young people can make a significant difference. In the YMCA and right across the Big Six youth organisations young people have stepped up during the pandemic by delivering supplies to vulnerable people, looking after each other's mental health, making masks, helping share vital public information and now actively facilitating the COVID vaccine campaign. 00:21:35 As the global pandemic enters the recovery and relief period it is crystal-clear that young people are disproportionately impacted by the immediate and long-term implications of disruption in education, employment opportunities, physical and mental health/well-being, to name a few. These two reasons - young people bearing the brunt of the impact of COVID and young people offering so many of the solutions - are what has inspired the Big Six organisations, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Foundation to support young people around the would in delivering and developing youth-led community solutions through the Global Youth mobilisation. I am so excited and I want young people all over the world to be excited and get involved. They can start by attending the Global Youth Summit, which will be held virtually from 23rd to 25th April. At the summit they will hear about the role of young people in the immediate and long-term COVID recovery. It's a great forum where we can share our thoughts, passions, ideas that will influence policies and decisions that impact all of our lives. 00:22:47 This is a critical time for my generation, for our generation to bring policymakers, change-makers, advocate together to address the major challenges confronting young people by solutions and put them into action in our communities. No matter how big or how small I encourage you to have the confidence to apply for funding. If you have an idea to a challenge created by the pandemic you can apply for funding from $500 to $5,000. It is young people like you and me who will evaluate and agree who gets support for these local solutions. So please visit our website, www.globalyouthmobilisation.org We are the movement by youth, for youth and young people really are the answer. We are not the challenge. We are truly being the change that we want to see in the world. Thank you. TAG Thank you. Thank you so much, Daisy - by youth, for youth - and thank you to both of you for your leadership and vision. I look forward to joining both of you at the World Youth Summit and I look forward to seeing what ideas we can help take forward through the Global Youth Mobilisation. This is a reminder that although we're all living through a dark time there are also many reasons for hope and optimism about the future. Christian, back to you. 00:24:24 CL Thank you very much, all, and thank you very much, Dr Tedros. We will start the round of questions and answers. To remind you, if you want to get into the queue for questions please press the raise your hand icon on your screen. We'll start with the first question from Carlos from El Mundo. Carlos, please unmute yourself. CA Hi. CL Go ahead, please. CA It's a question specifically for Greta. Isn't there a risk that the COP26 will lose its momentum? What should we change in the next three months for example to turn the tide and to put the two goals of climate change and vaccination equality on the same level? CL Thank you very much, Carlos. Yes, Greta Thunberg, please. 00:25:27 GT Of course there's a risk that COP will lose momentum but the most important thing is that everyone is safe and of course safety and health come first in these kinds of situations. Of course there's not just one thing that needs to change in order to break this trend that we are seeing now, there's not just one single thing that we can do to - so-called - solve the climate crisis and the vaccine inequity crisis. Of course it's a bit more complicated than that and I think I may not be the best person to answer that. I think there are lots of experts who are more suited for that question but we do need to change our mindsets, we do need to think globally and not only think about ourselves. That's what these crises come down to, that we only think about ourselves, that we don't think about others. They come down to the way we treat others, the way we treat other human beings, the way we treat other animals and nature itself so we need to change our mindsets, if you want one single thing; it's more complicated than but just one thing. CL Thank you very much, Greta. I'll ask Dr Maria Neira from WHO to add, possibly. 00:26:56 MN Thank you, Christian, and thank you very much, Greta. It's really a pleasure to have you with us. You are an inspiration. You have been driving an incredible movement and many people are behind so certainly the COP26 has to be something very successful. In response to your question, Carlos - hola - I think what will change the mindset and what might have an incredible impact is what the Director-General was saying at the beginning, the health argument of climate change. If we are able to explain to people that climate change is about our health, it is affecting our health and if we stop burning fossil fuels the benefits will be enormous in terms of reducing the process of climate change but as well on reducing air pollution. Air pollution, as mentioned again by the Director-General, is responsible for more than seven million premature deaths every year due to exposure to air pollution and in addition to that it creates an environment that makes our health more vulnerable and creates the perfect conditions for more emerging infectious diseases to occur. 00:28:12 So I think we have a perfect case here for creating more action at the COP26, giving the health benefits that can be obtained in an incredible way. If we tackle the causes of air pollution, if we tackle the causes of climate change that will be an enormous health agenda and talking about health is what can make this change that we all need in terms of ambition to go for more at [?] the COP and in convincing people. If we tell people that this is connected to human health I think this will be the final argument that will create much more motivation and engagement and probably a stronger movement to put political pressure on those who will take decisions and hopefully going for much more. Thank you. CL Thank you very much. This was Dr Maria Neira, Director for Environment, Climate Change and Health. The next question goes to Shoko Koyama from NHK. Shoko, please unmute yourself. SH Hello. Can you hear me? CL Go ahead, please. SH Thank you for taking my question. Regarding COVAX, UNICEF is trying to buy one billion syringes by the end of this year in order to distribute to countries together with vaccines. 00:29:37 One billion syringes in addition to the six to 800 million syringes they procure annually seems to be a large quantity. Is COVAX able to procure this huge number of syringes by the end of this year and what challenges are there regarding the procurement of syringes? Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Shoko. I'll give it to Dr Bruce Aylward. BA Thank you very much, Shoko, for the question and thanks for highlighting that it takes more to get the world vaccinated than simply to make and procure the vaccines because there are all the additional pieces that have to go into this including additional supplies like not just syringes, which you mentioned, but also the vaccination cold chains and other supplies that are necessary to keep them in the right conditions before we get them to the actual people who need to be vaccinated. 00:30:38 In terms of the syringes, just like the cold chain equipment the COVAX facility began working with countries way back in October or even earlier last year to look at what numbers of syringes would be required and to start working with manufactures to ensure that pipeline would be there. You might remember some months ago the Director-General invited Henrietta Fore, who is the Executive Director of UNICEF, to join one of these press conferences and at that time she explained what they were already doing to try and make sure that the necessary syringes would be in place. This will continue to be a challenge, just like all of the supplies necessary to get the world vaccinated, these extraordinary numbers but for the moment the pipelines are there and the producers are doing their part. But it all comes back again also to the COVAX facility having the resources it needs so that it can put the contracts in place up-front to make sure the supplies are there, not just the supplies in terms of the vaccines but, exactly as you highlight, the syringes and the other supplies including, as I mentioned, the cold chain equipment and sometimes very specialised cold chain equipment to get these products to people. 00:31:57 CL Thank you very much, Dr Aylward. We'll move on to Robin Mia from AFP. Robin, please unmute yourself. RO Thank you. A question for Greta, if I may. If vaccine inequity carries on and young people start being offered a vaccine in wealthy countries whilst at the same time elderly and wealthy people remain completely unprotected in poor countries, would you advocate a vaccine strike amongst younger people in rich countries until their governments start sharing more vaccines? Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Robin. Of course, Greta, the floor is yours. GT We must not forget that this is not a problem that is caused by individuals. This is a problem that needs to be addressed by the international community, governments and the vaccine developers. It is wrong; if we should start focusing on individuals and urging individuals not to take the vaccine that would send a very wrong message. 00:33:00 Of course everyone who is offered a vaccine should take it but we need to see the bigger picture here and be able to focus on several things at once. So no, I would not advocate for people not to take the vaccine. CL Thank you so much for that. We'll move to Jamil Chad from O Estado de Sao Paulo. Jamil, please unmute yourself. Jamil, do you hear us? Please unmute yourself. JA Can you hear me, Christian? CL Please go ahead. JA Can you hear me? CL Yes. JA Thank you. This is Jamil Chad, a journalist from Brazil. Ms Greta Thunberg, my question is about vaccines but also on climate change. What is your message to President Bolsonaro at this time when both the pandemic is hitting Brazil hard but also climate change is an issue? You'll note very well what is the position of President Bolsonaro. What is the message you can send him today? Thank you. CL Thank you so much, Jamil. Over to Greta. 00:34:24 GT Of course I don't think we should be focusing on talking about individuals since this is a much larger problem but of course Jair Bolsonaro has a huge responsibility both when it comes to the climate, environment and of course we can see the response that Brazil has had during the corona pandemic. I can only speak for myself but I can safely say that he has failed to take the responsibility that is necessary in order to safeguard present and future living conditions for humanity. CL Thank you very much, Greta. We'll move on to Navas Shah from Xinhua. Navas, please unmute yourself. Navas Shah, do you hear us? Please unmute yourself. It looks as if we're not getting to you so we will continue with Gunila Van Hal from Svenska Dagbladet. Gunila, please unmute yourself. GU Can you hear me? CL Wonderful. Go ahead. GU Thanks for taking my question. It is to Greta Thunberg and I'd like to know your view on the proposal from WHO and many governments, among those your own, the Swedish Government, that richer countries should donate remaining vaccine doses to poorer countries once their own risk groups have been vaccinated and before they vaccinate the rest of the population. 00:36:06 What do you think about this and what do you respond to people questioning this, saying, why should we sacrifice our own populations in order to save the world? Thank you. CL Thank you, Gunila. Over to Greta, please. GT I think that is a very reasonable thing to do. We need to protect and prioritise the most vulnerable people in risk groups and working on the front lines, no matter which countries they come from; at least that's my opinion. Of course I understand that people will be frustrated by that. Of course I also want to return to everyday life and everyone I know wants to do that as well but we need to act in solidarity and we need to use common sense when it comes to these issues. As I said, the only sensible thing to do, the only morally right thing to do is to prioritise the people who are the most vulnerable no matter whether they live in a high-income country or a low-income country. 00:37:23 CL Thank you very much, Ms Thunberg. We'll move ahead to Jamie Keaton from AP. Jamie, please unmute yourself. JM Thank you, Christian. My question is both for Ms Thunberg and Ms Moran. What is your message to young people who have become a major driver of COVID-19 infection? We heard the Director-General, Dr Tedros, just mention that increased social mixing among younger adults is possibly one of the reasons for the increase in infections and hospitalisations among people aged 25 to 59. If I could just sneak in a another question to Ms Thunberg, ahead of President Biden's climate summit what do you hope it will achieve? Thank you. CL No small questions today. Thank you very much, Jamie. Let's move to Greta Thunberg first and then on. Thank you. GT Yes, of course it's absolutely crucial that everyone takes our personal responsibility in this crisis. We young people may be the ones who are in general least affected by the virus in a direct way but of course, as I said, we need to act in solidarity with the people in risk groups. 00:38:57 Of course many young people fail to draw that connection maybe; of course not everyone but of course there will always be some. My message to those is that during crises like these we need to take a few steps back and act for the greater good of society and in order to protect our fellow citizens and of course especially people in risk groups because that is the thing you do during crises; you step up for one another. My hopes for the Biden summit; I hope that we will soon in one way or another start treating this crisis like a crisis - the climate crisis, that is - because if we are to be blunt, we can have as many summits as we want, we can have as many meetings and conferences as we want and make nice speeches and nice pledges like next year or 2050 and so on. But as long as those things contain so many loopholes as they do and as long as we are not actually treating the crisis as a crisis of course we won't be able to achieve any major changes. As I mentioned earlier, we need to change our mindsets and we need to change or view of the world. We cannot try to solve this crisis with the same approach that got us into it in the first place so we need to start treating the crisis like a crisis. 00:40:40 Without an increased level of awareness among people in general of course there will be no pressure on world leaders to actually start making the changes that are necessary to safeguard humanity so my hope is that we will start treating the crisis like a crisis. CL Thank you so much, Greta. Let me first give the floor to Daisy Moran from the global youth organisation [unclear]. Daisy. DM Thank you and thank you for your question. I believe my generation, our generation that we are representing is a generation of allyship because we understand our privilege and how to use our privileges to uplift those in the most vulnerable situations. The Global Youth Summit is a platform and a forum for all of youth and stakeholders and supporters to come together to really listen to what are the policy changes that need to be made so that we can have more equitable societies and systems in place. So I hope that you can join us this weekend while we discuss the important issues and challenges facing our generation and how our youth leaders are in a position to create the most innovative solutions to tackle these big issues. Thank you. 00:41:59 CL Thanks so much, Daisy. Now we'll move to Dr Maria Van Kerkhove. MK Thanks, Christian. Those were excellent answers but I did want to clarify something here with regard to increased transmission. We are seeing increased rates of infection across all age groups. Last week there were 5.2 million cases reported to WHO globally, the largest in a single week since this pandemic began, 16 months into the pandemic. That is the largest increase in a week that we have seen to date. We've seen an increase across all age groups. We need to take the blame away and in the question it was meant to blame and we can't do that. Everyone has a role to play in this pandemic. We all have a role to play in keeping ourselves and our loved ones safe. What we are seeing is a slight age shift in some countries driven by social mixing and social mixing doesn't necessarily mean going out and having a party. It means individuals who have to leave their home to go to work, it means individuals have to feed their families and if you increase social mixing for a variety of reasons, whether this is for work or for religious reasons or indeed socialising itself the virus will take advantage of that. 00:43:18 If you add on top of it these variants of concern, variants that are circulating around the world, particularly the B117 variant which is circulating in a large number of countries across the globe that have increased transmissibility; if you add variants that have increased transmissibility with increased mixing this virus will take off and case numbers will increase. In a number of countries we've seen a very, very steep incline due to this. In addition to that we are seeing some countries not able to implement the public health and social measures that are needed to allow for physical distancing and in many parts of the world physical distancing is really not possible but in other parts of the world it is. So we need to do what we can to avoid those crowded settings, avoid those settings where social mixing - particularly indoor, crowded settings where there's poor ventilation, where the virus really likes to spread efficiently between individuals. 00:44:18 We need governments to enable people to carry out those measures; very easy for us to say stay home if you can but we need governments to support individuals to work from home, to stay home if necessary so that we can reduce the possibility for the virus to spread. All of us really have a role to play. Youth, young people, children, young adults are showing us ways in which to be innovative, to remain socially connected yet physically distant. I think what we are seeing with the youth and this youth mobilisation is really energetic. There's a spirit, there's an energy here that is holding leaders accountable and saying, help us help the situation and I'm really inspired to see that. I was really happy to hear the by youth, for youth as you pointed out and showing us that young people, young adults, children can make a significant difference every day. So please let's stop the blame in terms of who is spreading. All of us have a role to play, all of us need to be supported in taking those individual-level measures as well as measures at the family, at the community, at the sub-national, at the international level. 00:45:30 CL Thanks so much, Dr Van Kerkhove. We have Dr Mike Ryan, WHO Health Emergencies Executive Director, to add. MR Thanks, Christian. I just want to reflect on one thing that Daisy said. She said youths are not the problem, youths are the solution and I fundamentally believe in that and thank you, Daisy, for saying that and the energy from everyone today is fantastic. Reflecting on something that Greta said, she spoke about mindset and mindset is everything and Tedros reminds of that every day, I think; it's one of his most common pronouncements about mindset and it doesn't matter what problem you're trying to solve. There's no amount of announcement, there's no amount of recommendations, there's no amount of anything that changes anything until we change our mindset and that can be the mindset about protecting ourselves and our families from COVID and taking precautions. It can be the mindset on government's response to COVID. It can be the mindset driving climate action and reducing climate change. 00:46:37 So I think really we all need to reflect on that. It is our mindsets that drive our behaviour, both positive and negative and they're having a huge impact on the planet and obviously our behaviour's having a huge impact on the trajectory of this pandemic. Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Dr Ryan. The next question in line comes from Isabel Sacco from EFE. Isabel, please unmute yourself. IS Good afternoon, thank you, Christian. I would like to know if you can give us an overview of the proportion of the people under 40 years old who are in ICUs globally or by region. Connected to that, what do we know about mortality among babies? I saw figures from Brazil that indicate that 1,300 babies have died there from COVID. Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Isabel; very detailed questions. Let me give to Dr Maria Van Kerkhove first. MK Thanks for these very important questions. I cannot give you a specific answer of the proportion of those under 40 in ICU but what I can say is that there is an increasing number of hospitalisations among younger individuals and this is driven by what I answered in the last part of the question. 00:48:01 When you have increased transmissibility across all age groups you will see increased rates of hospitalisation, you will see an increased proportion of ICU and you will see increases in death. We are seeing unfortunately a little bit of a shift in the age structure in terms of the median age of individuals who are infected but that is driven by changes in social mixing patterns. If you remember, last spring, in the northern hemisphere's spring we saw a similar situation where as societies were opening up across Europe for example there was an age shift in the median age; it went from an older age group to a slightly younger age group. Again this is driven by people who are leaving their homes to go back to work and if there is the virus that is spreading, if you have virus variants this is a dangerous combination. We are seeing increases in hospitalisation among younger age groups and increased ICU and increased deaths. 00:48:55 With regard to children I did see that report that you mentioned about Brazil. Overall if we look at infection among children, if we look at severity among children still around the world there is a lower proportion of children that experience disease, that experience severe disease and some children do die. If there is a lot of virus that is circulating, if you have millions of cases being reported - and you know so far we've had 140 million cases reported worldwide - we will see deaths in all age groups. With regard to the youngest children, overall they tend to be more mild but again this is not universal. We do see that children, particularly children with underlying conditions but children in general, have died from COVID. So everyone is at risk from this virus. People are at risk of getting infected, at risk of getting severe disease so we do need to do what we can where we can as much as we can to first and foremost prevent infections but also making sure that we use the systems that are in place to get tested, to be able to carry out the public health actions that do prevent the spread from an adult to a child, from a child to an adult; everything that we can to really prevent that level of infection and care for as many people as we can, getting them early into that clinical care pathway to receive the care based on the symptoms that they have. 00:50:28 CL Thank you so much. The next question goes to Akwazi Sarpong from BBC News Africa. Akwazi, please unmute yourself. Akwazi, do you hear us? Yes, please go ahead. AK [Inaudible]. CL Akwazi, the sound is really bad. Please try one more time. AK Yes, [inaudible] in Ghana so [inaudible]. I have two questions. I would like [sound slip] many young people living with disability, particularly visual impairment, have been affected by this virus in Africa and at the global level. The second question is, what programmes are in place to support families with children and young persons with disability and special needs to help us combat this? Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Akwazi; very important questions. I'll hand to Dr Van Kerkhove for a start. 00:51:35 MK I can start. In fact we have departments that are working particularly on persons with disabilities to ensure that persons with disabilities, who are disproportionately affected by COVID-19 in a variety of ways, whether this is about getting the right care, receiving information appropriately so that they know how to keep themselves safe, making sure that they have the ability to receive the materials they need, testing, etc. We have some guidance that is coming out, I hope, today - it was approved yesterday - looking specifically at the more than one billion people worldwide who are living with disabilities, making sure that they have access to vaccination for example. We have seen some innovation in terms of personal protective equipment; if you've noticed, some of the masks for example will have a clear panel so that you can see lips moving for people who have a hearing impairment so there are a number of innovations that are coming online to support individuals with disabilities but also families with disabilities as well because even individuals with disabilities; their caretakers have to be able to care for them. So we need to make sure that those caregivers are protected against the virus as well so there're a number of activities that are underway to ensure those living with disabilities as well as those caring for those with disabilities have the appropriate care and information that they need. 00:53:05 CL Thank you very much, Dr Van Kerkhove. The next question goes to Priti Padnaik from Geneva Health Files. Priti, please unmute yourself. No, Priti lowered her hand apparently in the meantime or we don't find you any more. The next question goes to John Zaracostas from The Lancet. John, please unmute yourself. JO Good afternoon. Can you hear me there? CL Very well. Go ahead. JO I was wondering if you could give me up-to-date estimates on how many vaccine facilities worldwide with excess capacity could be enabled to produce vaccines and secondly, if possible, if Dr Tedros could give us his perspective on what's going on in his homeland where right now they're facing an existential threat. CL Thank you very much. We'll take the first question and I guess we'll see if Mariangela Simao is online... or then... SS I could start. CL Dr Swaminathan; exactly. Please go ahead. SS Thank you. Thank you very much, John, for that question. This is exactly the work that we've started now as part of the COVID vaccine manufacturing taskforce with our COVAX partners, CEPI, GAVI, UNICEF as well as the private sector and regional bodies like the African Union but also other regional organisations. The idea really is to take a short-to-medium-term and a longer-term approach. The short-term and the immediate need is to increase vaccine supplies within the next weeks and months and that can be done by unblocking roadblocks and obstacles that have been identified by the manufacturers and by working with suppliers of those critical ingredients and raw materials so that we can link suppliers and manufacturers as well as work with member states to make sure that export bans and things like that don't interfere with the process of vaccine manufacturing. That's our immediate short-term priority which hopefully will be able to put more doses for COVAX in the coming weeks. The second, more medium-term, is to look at fill and finish capacity to link... 00:55:43 We know that there's a lot of unused fill and finish capacity globally and therefore we need manufacturers who have the capacity to make bulk product and link them with these existing fill and finish capacities in facilities around the world. CEPI already has done a mapping of that and it exists. Then the third, more medium to longer-term, is really to develop new facilities that would build on existing facilities, particularly in low and middle-income countries and get technology transfer, encourage companies. As the DG mentioned, the WHO put out a call on Friday both for owners of technology, particularly MRNA technology to begin with, to come forward to work with us to share that technology, share the know-how and experience with recipient companies that will be selected according to a set of criteria that we are developing. 00:56:40 This will ensure not only supplies for this pandemic - though it may take a few months to get up and running if we start with existing facilities with some expertise - but also will help the future regional health security of regions which currently do not have any manufacturing capacity. This obviously can be extended to vaccines for many other infectious diseases. So that's what the taskforce is looking at and over the coming days we will provide much more detail. Thank you. CL Thank you so much, Dr Swaminathan. I'm calling on Dr Mike Ryan to take the other part. MR Thank you, John; important question. The situation in Tigray in Ethiopia remains very, very dire at the moment. The situation is not improving. We have unpredictable access, increasing humanitarian needs, increasing sexual violence. The response has been hindered by armed clashes throughout the region and many areas are still not receiving food or other assistance. We've got 4.5 million people affected by this crisis. 2.5 million of them have no access to services whatsoever. Half a million people have no access to food. We have a million internally displaced people in 178 sites scattered across the region being served by IOM and UNHCR. 00:58:18 We've had over 800 cases of sexual and gender-based violence reported from just five hospitals alone; that many cases. We've over 62,000 refugees who have crossed into Sudan. That safety valve is very, very difficult to manage and very difficult for us to have access from that side and to support people in the affected area. So, as I said, unpredictable access, displacement, tremendous humanitarian needs but we have 20 health partners working with us who are operational on the ground but they're only accessing about half of the... where aid is concerned. When we look at health facilities, we've done a health facilities survey throughout the region in 264 health facilities. As of now only 72 of those facilities are operational and 40 of those are only partially accessible. 19 hospitals have been completely damaged or destroyed; 15 more with major damage. There're inadequate supply chains across the board. 00:59:23 So the situation in Tigray could not be more dire, the people there could not be in more need of support and help. The situation is deteriorating. The situation is very much a massive concern on a purely humanitarian basis here. There is a health crisis on top of a humanitarian crisis. We're very concerned about malnutrition, about malaria, about cholera, measles, COVID-19 - positivity rates have been rising - and other diseases like meningitis and other diseases that will exploit malnutrition, they will exploit stress and they will exploit all of what's happening in that population. We have resumed surveillance activities but only covering about 30% of the population and again severe, acute malnutrition is a major, major issue. It is very hard to overstate the extent of the humanitarian crisis and the health crisis currently unfolding in Tigray and the WHO and the other UN agencies and NGOs are calling for unfettered humanitarian access and for military conflict and those perpetrating the conflict to remove themselves from civilian areas and those who should not be there should not be there. Thank you. CL Thank you very much. This was Dr Mike Ryan, Executive Director for WHO's Health Emergencies Programme and Dr Bruce Aylward wanted to come in too. 01:00:51 BA Thanks, Christian. I just want to come back to the important point you raised, John, about how much capacity is unused around the world right now because there was huge attention last week at the conference of the African Union on the consultation that was called by the World Trade Organization to try to expand vaccine production globally. But we need to remember that the challenge is how we're actually using the doses that are being made because last week while those conferences were taking place 100 million more doses of vaccine were administered around the world. The issue, John, is where they're being administered because 1% of that 100 million went to low-income countries so 99 million doses of vaccine last week went into high, upper-middle-income and some low-middle-income countries but only 1% of that went to the lowest-income countries. 01:01:48 So every time we bring new capacities online, when we bring new deals online, etc, that you're hearing about we need to ask the question of where those doses are going because those doses are not going to the places that have got the least vaccine today. So we need to be careful in thinking that we can simply build additional capacity because that capacity is still going to the wrong places, quite frankly. While we are giving great attention to how we expand capacity it's going to take weeks and months for that to come online and in the meantime we've got to take some urgent and important decisions about how we are going to use the vaccines that exist today because if we have a lot more weeks where 100, 99% of the vaccine goes to a set of countries that already have most of the vaccine we are not going to get out of this crisis as rapidly and efficiently and with the least lives lost possible. CL Thank you very much for all your answers. With this we're coming to the end of our question-and-answer session. I was very glad to have you all online today and our special guests and I will ask our special guests to start the closing round and we'll go in reverse order. We'll start with Daisy Moran, the Global Youth Mobilisation, Youth [Unclear] and Worldwide YMCA representative. Daisy, please go ahead. 01:03:20 DM Thank you for the opportunity once again and as a reminder, please join us this weekend on April 23rd to 25th to have your voice heard. You have the solutions; please come to the table. We want you to be involved in your local communities and we have the funds to support you. With any questions please visit our website at www.youthglobalmobilisation.org Thank you. CL Fantastic. Thanks so much. Now we go to Elahi Rawshan, volunteer from the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, supporting young people in Bangladesh. Elahi, please go ahead. ER Thank you. I would like to thank everyone for inviting me here and I would like to echo the last voice; young people are the solution and I would like to invite all the localised solutions to collaborate with the Global Youth Mobilisation, who have been supporting these local actions and promoting them. 01:04:22 So I would also like to invite everyone to join the Global Youth Summit coming up this week from 23rd to 25th. Thank you once again. CL Thank you so much, Elahi, to you. Last but not least we go to Greta Thunberg, Climate and Environmental Activist. Greta, the floor is yours. GT To be honest I don't really have anything more to add. Just take care, everyone. But also while we have media here, I really urge you to really bring awareness to this issue of vaccine inequity because you have the power to raise awareness about this. When we talk about countries like, for example, the UK and the US - just as a few examples - that they are mass-vaccinating large groups of their populations, even healthier young people, we see it from a different perspective, that we don't always see it from our Western, privileged point of view but rather that we think globally and we need to prioritise those most vulnerable first. Thank you. Take care, everyone. CL Thank you so much, Greta, for these words. Yes, there's hardly anything to add; I agree. From my side let me thank everyone and remind you that the sound files of this press briefing will be shared right afterwards today and the transcript will be available as of tomorrow. Dr Tedros. TAG Thank you. Thank you, Christian. I would like to thank our guests today, Greta, Elahi and Daisy. You have been wonderful. Thank you so much indeed. I would also like to join you in inviting everybody to join on the 23rd to 25th the Global Youth Summit, from Friday to Sunday so I look forward to seeing you there. I would also like to thank our media colleagues who have joined and see you in our upcoming presser. That will be on Friday. Thank you so much. 01:06:54

Butantan recebe 3 mil litros de insumo para produção da Coronavac

Saiba mais em www.vacinaja.sp.gov.br

Coletiva de imprensa: anúncios do Governo - 20/04/2021

O Governador João Doria anunciou nesta terça-feira (20) a antecipação da vacinação contra COVID-19 para quem tem 64 anos para sexta-feira (23), além da inclusão de novos públicos na campanha a partir de maio. “As boas notícias estão concentradas na vacinação, na vacina do Butantan, a vacina da vida que São Paulo está levando a todo o Brasil e torcendo também para que mais vacinas sejam disponibilizadas para os brasileiros. O que definitivamente mudará as nossas vidas dessa trágica situação da pandemia é a vacinação”, declarou o Governador. Com início do cronograma seis dias antes do previsto para quem tem 64 anos, SP passa a alcançar três novas faixas etárias ainda nesta semana. Na quarta (21), começa a imunização de idosos de 65 e 66 anos. Para quem tem 63, fica mantida a data de 29 de abril, já na próxima semana. A partir de 6 de maio, será a vez dos idosos de 60, 61 e 62 anos. Ainda em maio, novos públicos passam a integrar a campanha. A partir do dia 10, a vacinação começa para 50 mil pessoas com Síndrome de Down, 40 mil pacientes renais em tratamento de diálise (Terapia Renal Substitutiva) e 30 mil transplantados em uso de imunossupressores. Nesses três grupos, serão aplicadas doses em pessoas adultas, na faixa de 18 a 59 anos, pois idosos pertencentes a esses públicos já estão contemplados nas etapas previamente anunciadas. No dia 11, será iniciada a imunização dos trabalhadores de Metrô e CPTM, da área de segurança, manutenção, limpeza e agentes de estação na linha de frente com 47 anos ou mais, além de operadores de trem de todas as idades. O público estimado nessa categoria é de 10 mil pessoas. Já no dia 18, os motoristas e cobradores de ônibus do transporte coletivo municipal e intermunicipal poderão começar a receber a primeira dose. São Paulo estima que cerca de 165 mil trabalhadores do setor iniciem a imunização contra o coronavírus no próximo mês. “Estamos esperando e sempre contamos com mais vacinas. Há alguma sinalização do Ministério da Saúde, mas contamos que a Fiocruz entregará as suas vacinas e, portanto, estaremos cumprindo esse cronograma e avançando em faixas etárias”, afirmou Regiane de Paula, Coordenadora Geral do Programa Estadual de Imunização Ao longo de abril, São Paulo também iniciou a imunização dos públicos de 67 e 68 anos de idade, além de profissionais da ativa das forças de segurança e trabalhadores de escolas públicas e privadas da educação básica a partir de 47 anos. O cronograma atualizado da campanha está disponível para download e compartilhamento na página https://issuu.com/governosp/docs/apresenta__o_vacina__o_5be991233b8920 . Quem faz parte dos públicos-alvo da campanha pode realizar um pré-cadastro no site Vacina Já (vacinaja.sp.gov.br). O preenchimento do formulário leva de um a três minutos e economiza até 90% do tempo de atendimento nos postos de vacinação. O cadastramento online não é obrigatório, mas facilita a rotina das equipes da saúde e dos pacientes. Outra ferramenta digital é o Vacinômetro, que permite o monitoramento em tempo real da campanha. Os números mostram que São Paulo é o estado que mais vacina no Brasil, em números absolutos, e está prestes a alcançar 10 milhões de doses aplicadas. Às 13h21 desta terça, o Vacinômetro marcou um total de 9.595.215 de aplicações, somando 6.287.718 de primeira dose e 3.307.497 da segunda, número que equivale ao total de pessoas que já completaram o esquema vacinal.

Mito: "es mentira que podemos vacunarnos porque no hay dosis suficientes para todos"

Serie: Respuesta de la ciencia a los mitos más escuchados sobre vacunación y #COVID19​ Dra. Lucia Alonso. Epidemióloga. Consultora de OPS. Integra el Grupo Asesor Científico Honorario (GACH) de la Presidencia de la República y también el Comité de Emergencia para COVID-19 que asesora al director general de la Organización Mundial de la Salud (OMS), es profesora adjunta en el Departamento de Medicina Preventiva y Social de la Facultad de Medicina de la Universidad de la República. Uruguay

Media briefing on COVID-19 - 16/04/2021

00:00:24 CL Hello and good day to wherever you are listening to us today. It's Friday 16th April and for us at least it's an unusual hour to have this press briefing so thank you anyway for joining us at this time. My name is Christian Lindmeier and I'm welcoming you to today's global COVID-19 press conference. We have a few special guests today who I would like to briefly announce as we will discuss the impact of COVID-19 in Papua New Guinea and the Western Pacific region and the actions that are being taken there to respond. First and foremost we have the Honourable Jelta Wong, the Minister of Health in Papua New Guinea. We have Dr Takeshi Kasai, the WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific. We have Ms Anna Maalsen, the Acting Representative for WHO in Papua New Guinea. Welcome. Simultaneous interpretation is provided in the six official UN languages as usual, Arabic, Chinese, French, English, Spanish and Russian, plus we have Portuguese and Hindi. Now let me introduce the participants in the room. Of course we have Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. We have Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, Technical Lead on COVID-19. We have Dr Mariangela Simao, Assistant Director-General for Access to Medicines and Health Products. We have Dr Bruce Aylward, Special Advisor to the Director-General and the lead on the ACT Accelerator and we will be joined by Dr Mike Ryan and Dr Soumya Swaminathan later. 00:02:03 With this let me start differently because we have journalists from the Western Pacific online. Just a note to everybody; in case you want to get in line for questions please use the raise your hand icon on your screen in order to get into the queue for questions. Now I hand over to the Director-General for the opening remarks. Apologies. TAG Thank you. Thank you, Christian. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening. Around the world cases and deaths are continuing to increase at worrying rates. Globally the number of new cases per week has nearly doubled over the past two months. This is approaching the highest rate of infection that we have seen so far during the pandemic. Some countries that had previously avoided widespread transmission are now seeing steep increases in infections. One of those countries is Papua New Guinea. Until the beginning of this year Papua New Guinea had reported fewer than 900 cases and just nine deaths. 00:03:18 It has now reported more than 9,300 cases and 82 deaths. While these numbers are still smaller than other countries the increase is sharp and WHO is very concerned about the potential for a much larger epidemic. There is large-scale community transmission in the capital, Port Moresby, and the Western province and all 22 provinces have now reported cases although in the last two weeks we have seen some decline. Roll-out of the AstraZeneca vaccine started in late March with 8,000 doses donated by Australia and a further 132,000 doses from COVAX arrived this week. The vaccine is being offered first to priority groups including health workers to protect the local health system. Through WHO's global outbreak alert and response network or GOARN 13 experts have been deployed to support the government with case management, epidemiology, infection prevention and control, laboratory support and information management. Emergency medical teams from Australia, Germany and the United States have also arrived to support the response with others expected in the coming weeks. 00:04:45 WHO is continuing to work closely with the National Department of Health and partners to provide technical advice and support and to boost local health response capacity. This includes an emphasis on expanding testing. Papua New Guinea is a perfect example of why vaccine equity is so important. It has held COVID-19 at bay for so long but with rising infections, understandable fatigue with social restrictions, low levels of immunity among the population and a fragile health system it's vital that it receives more vaccines as soon as possible. I would like to use this opportunity to thank Australia for donating vaccines to Papua New Guinea and also my discussions with the Foreign Minister of Australia, who has expressed full support to Papua New Guinea. 00:05:48 Today I am pleased to welcome Papua New Guinea's Minister of Health, the Honourable Jelta Wong. Minister, thank you for your leadership at this difficult time for your nation and thank you so much for taking the time to join us today. You have the floor, Minister. JW Thank you very much, Dr Tedros. Good day, everyone. Greetings from Papua New Guinea. Thank you for this opportunity to share our situation here in Papua New Guinea, a land of some eight million people and 800 different languages nestled in the Western Pacific region or, we simply say, among the Pacific Islands. My name is Jelta Wong. I am the Minister of Health in Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea's infection rate continues to rise rapidly and as a responsible Government it is our duty to make vaccines available to our people who need them the most. As of 12:00pm on 15th April 2021 Papua New Guinea has reported 9,343 confirmed cases of COVID-19 including over 80 deaths. Half of these cases and half of these deaths were reported in the last month alone, highlighting the large-scale community transmission in our capital city, the national capital district and four other provinces, East New Britain, Eastern Islands Province, Western Islands Province, Morobe and the Western Province. 00:07:34 Out of these numbers we have increasing numbers of health workers, about 273 out of 4,504 in the last month, who were infected and we are expecting to see these numbers rise. Our immediate priority is to protect our health workers and our key workers in the front line. This prompted my Government to reach out to our neighbour, Australia, for an emergency supply of vaccines ahead of our COVAX supply. Australia has responded immediately, allowing us to begin roll-out of 8,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine sent in late March. To date we have had about 1,600 persons vaccinated in our national capital district. Thanks to the COVAX facility Papua New Guinea has received its first batch of 132,000 AstraZeneca vaccines earlier this week. We are truly grateful. With support from WHO and UNICEF we are preparing to roll out this nation-wide by May. The vaccines will be distributed to all provinces, initially targeting our healthcare workers and other front-line essential workers. Through the COVAX facility a total of 588,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine will be made available to Papua New Guineans. We hope to receive all this by June. To support the current surge we're facing three more emergency medical teams arrived in the country over the last week to help our health facilities with clinical management. 00:09:26 This was made possible with the co-ordination and support of WHO. We still have many challenges but we have made some significant progress in the response. Measures have been introduced including mask-wearing, social distancing, restrictions on travel, mass gatherings and passenger limits on public transport. However we know that there are ongoing challenges with compliance. We did not expect this to happen overnight. We continue to work to address this. Our biggest challenge is seemingly the late adoption or acceptance of the new normal and the disbelief in the disease itself. This overlaps into much infodemic and conspiracies and misinformation on the safety and the efficiency of the vaccines. To overcome this vaccine hesitancy especially among our health workforce our Prime Minister, the Honourable James Marbe, our Governor-General, our Chief Justice, our Cardinal, together with myself and our other leaders... to send a strong statement from our country's leadership that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and will also help protect our people. 00:10:50 It is this Government's desire to ensure that no Papua New Guinean is left behind and we ensure to get every message; with the help of WHO, UNICEF and our foreign partners we are ensuring... to make sure that everyone is vaccinated. Again, Dr Tedros, your helping getting us the first batch of the AstraZeneca through the COVAX facility and Tekashi-san, thank you very much. Our country is in a much better place knowing that these vaccines are now in country and it is now our job to make sure that the people are reliably informed and start taking the vaccine so we can allow people to travel overseas and allow them to live longer lives. Thank you very much and God bless. TAG Thank you. Thank you so much, Minister, and thank you also to the Prime Minister, thank you for everything you're doing. Please rest assured of WHO's total support for your Government and your people at this difficult time. 00:12:18 I know that we have a very dedicated and skilled country office in Papua New Guinea and it's now my pleasure to welcome WHO's Acting Representative in Papua New Guinea, Anna Maalsen. Anna, thank you for joining us and please tell us about the challenges you face and the steps that WHO is taking to address them. You have the floor, Anna. AM Thank you, DG, Dr Tedros. Greetings to you all from Papua New Guinea. As both our WHO Director-General and Health Minister Wong have indicated the situation in Papua New Guinea is critical. We're seeing infection rates climb and there's intense transmission of COVID-19 in parts of PNG, putting enormous pressure on hospitals, intensive care units, health workers and communities. The increasing number of healthcare worker infections are cause for concern and this will already have an impact on PNG's small and ageing workforce. This will directly impact the number of healthcare workers available to provide care for people needing essential services, making it difficult for hospitals to maintain those as well as cope with the increased demands placed on the health system by the growing COVID-19 rates. Long turn-around times for PCR testing have impacted on the country's ability to respond quickly. However the nation-wide roll-out of the rapid point-of-care antigens test is really a game-changer for the country as we're able to roll these out and expand these to facilities in much of rural Papua New Guinea. 00:14:03 This low-cost new technology is really a boost to the country's ability to detect cases and respond appropriately to reduce transmission. This week, as already mentioned, the arrival of 132 doses of AstraZeneca from the COVAX facility this week combined with the 8,000 gifted by Australia means that healthcare workers are now being or will be vaccinated as a first priority to reduce the risk of COVID-19 and to immediately address the challenges posed by the increasing healthcare worker infections. Together WHO with UNICEF continue to provide the guidance and technical support to the Government of Papua New Guinea to ensure safe vaccination with effective and quality vaccines. Advocacy efforts are being fast-tracked. We're having to do this at the same time as training our trainers for the roll-out of the vaccines. 00:15:02 We're doing this with new technology through virtual trainings with our provincial health authorities and really ensuring that our healthcare workers are confident and capable to administer the vaccines in a safe way. Putting together and supporting our provinces with systems for tracking adverse events following immunisation is also a critical part of our support right now as well as addressing the misinformation through partnerships with social media platforms to address the existing vaccine hesitancy. In response to the Government's request for support in clinical care and case management, as already mentioned, we've deployed or supported the deployment of three emergency medical teams that have arrived in country. We have Ausmat, the Australian team that are here based in the national capital district, in the National Referral Hospital. From the US team, Rubicon, who've travelled to Mount Hagen in the Western Highlands, one of the most populous areas of the country... And from Germany we have Johanita, who is working with St John's here at the Nightingale COVID care centre in the national capital district. 00:16:17 If the needs escalate in other areas teams may be retasked or redeployed to provide search support to other provinces. Supporting that clinical management and care pathway is a really important part of our support. PNG is also seeing countries reach out with much-needed PPE and supplies including oxygen concentrators and biomedical equipment to support the quality of care. WHO is supporting the scale-up of sustainable oxygen systems as a critical part of the country's response, which will have longer-lasting benefits for the health system. WHO will continue to support the PNG Government and work with the National Department of Health, the National Control Centre and other development partners to boost and strengthen the local capacity across the country to ensure that Papua New Guinea has access to safe vaccination and to suppress the current outbreak and slow the spread of COVID-19 in Papua New Guinea. Thank you very much. 00:17:19 TAG Thank you. Thank you, Anna, and thank you for everything you and your team are doing. I send my greetings to the whole team there. You make us very proud. Papua New Guinea is one of 37 countries in WHO's Western Pacific region. Although the first cases of COVID-19 were reported from the Western Pacific the region still has the fewest cases and deaths of WHO's six regions. Many of its countries have applied lessons learned from past experience with infectious disease outbreaks like SARS, MERS and influenza and have been strong examples of how COVID can be contained with proven public health measures. Cases are now increasing sharply in Papua New Guinea and some other countries in the region. The trajectory is worrying and the situation is fragile. To tell us more it's my honour to introduce the Regional Director of the Western Pacific, Dr Takeshi Kasai. My brother, Takeshi, thank you so much to you and your team in Manila and in each of your 37 countries for everything you continue to do to serve the people of the Western Pacific. Thank you so much for your leadership. You have the floor, Takeshi. TK Thank you very much, DG, and good morning, good afternoon and good evening. I really appreciate the opportunity to highlight the situation of Papua New Guinea and the Pacific more broadly to the global media. 00:18:57 Our region is home to around one-quarter of the world's population but so far we have been relatively fortunate in this COVID-19 pandemic. We have recorded just 1.6% of the global confirmed COVID-19 cases and 1.2% of confirmed deaths. In fact some countries in the Pacific are among the small number of countries in the world which are yet to record a single COVID-19 case. There's no single or simple reason as to why our region has fared comparatively well but long-term investment is one key factor. Countries have spent more than a decade preparing for events with pandemic potential by strengthening preparedness and response capacity including the public health system such as contract tracing. 00:20:02 But, as Dr Tedros said, several countries in the region including Papua New Guinea are now experiencing surges in cases. The pandemic means that every corner of every country in every part of the world must be prepared and protected against COVID-19 and we must continue to pay special attention to small countries who have so far been able to stop the virus coming in. In remote Pacific countries even a few cases could have a devastating impact. As we heard from the earlier speakers, the COVID-19 situation in Papua New Guinea is extremely challenging right now. I really want to recognise the efforts of the Papua New Guinea Government under the leadership of Prime Minister Marape, Health Minister Wong and COVID-19 Response Controller, David Manning. They have been bringing together all of the Government and different sectors and as much as possible trying to get ahead of the curve by strengthening response capacity in all provinces across the country. I would also like to thank all partners, in particular Australia, for their very, very strong support including helping to get international [?] emergency medical teams on the ground and securing vital supplies of vaccine. 00:21:49 WHO is also working side-by-side with our UN colleagues, especially UNICEF and I would especially like to acknowledge the strong support of the UN resident co-ordinator. I'd like to make a couple more quick points before closing about the vaccines. It was wonderful to see more vaccines arriving in Papua New Guinea from COVAX this week but there are still countries in the Pacific which are yet to receive any vaccines or have only received very few doses and I couldn't agree more with the DG's point about vaccine equity. At the same time it is important to emphasise that vaccine alone will not end the Papua New Guinea outbreak or the pandemic, not yet. Because [unclear] our best defence until the majority of people in every country are vaccinated is still to keep up with all the other protective behaviours we know work, including strong enforcement of non-pharmaceutical donations, as Honourable Minister Wong mentioned. WHO continues to support the Papua New Guinea Government and calls on the entire PNG populations to keep up with [unclear]. Do everything you can to fight the virus and stay safe. Thank you very much, DG, for this opportunity. 00:23:28 TAG Thank you. Thank you so much, Takeshi, and my greetings to all of our colleagues in the regional office. We're very proud to serve with you. I'm glad that today we have been able to showcase the incredible capacity of WHO to provide support on the ground in countries at the regional level and here at headquarters. At the global level we continue to assess the evolution of the pandemic and to adjust our advice accordingly. Under the International Health Regulations the emergency committee held its seventh meeting yesterday and I look forward to receiving its advice on Monday. Globally our message to all people in all countries remains the same; we all have a role to play in ending the pandemic. Christian, back to you. CL Thank you very much, Dr Tedros. Thank you very much to all of you. We'll start the round of questions and again if you want to be put in the queue please raise your hand with the raise your hand icon on the screen. I'm very glad to be calling upon a journalist from the Western Pacific region as I see here on the screen that's Johnny Blades from Radio NZ Pacific. Johnny, please unmute yourself. 00:24:46 JO Thank you. Kia ora from New Zealand. I hope you can all hear me. Thanks to the panellists for making time to address us all on this very pressing situation. I just have a question for Health Minister, Mr Wong. Given the challenges that you've mentioned and others as well, challenges with the disbelief in the virus in PNG, vaccine hesitancy and the significant logistical challenges of getting doses and teams out to the various parts of your country, how can the Government expect to get anything near a majority of people vaccinated in PNG, is it possible? CL Thank you very much for this question, Johnny. I'll hand over to the Honourable Minister. JW [Inaudible], Johnny, but thank you for your question. It's a good question. Since COVID-19 has been announced to the world we've always had a group of people that have been against believing in it. Slowly with the resources we've received from WHO and UNICEF and the information that we've got we've translated and tried to push it out to every single province using our PHA systems. 00:26:27 The vaccine is not the first vaccine that we've ever pushed around the country. We've had different types of vaccines and we held a meeting to roll it out and we've had a lot of support from outside on how to move logistically through the provinces and then to allow the provinces to take over and make sure that the people get vaccinated. From the dialogue that we get back from the provinces a lot more people in the provinces have come forward wanting to be vaccinated so the messaging is getting out there and every day... It's not going to be easy but it's something that we're going to have to work towards to ensure a safer Papua New Guinea. As a responsible Government we must have these plans in place to ensure that our people are safe. CL Thank you very much, Honourable Minister. With this we move to the next and it's Corinne Gretler from Bloomberg. Corinne, please unmute yourself. CO Hi. Thanks for taking my question. I know you're tracking various variants but I wanted to ask you about the B1617 variant that's emerging in India. I think it was first detected in October but it's now appeared in other countries around the world and it's being linked to why the wave in India appears to be more severe this time around. 00:28:16 So I just wanted to hear your latest; what's your current assessment of it, have you heard more chatter about it, and maybe just talk about it a little bit more. CL Thank you very much, Corinne. Let me hand to Dr Van Kerkhove. MK Thanks very much for the question. This virus variant is a variant of interest, the B1617 lineage. This was first detected and reported by India, having two mutations; the E484Q and the L452R; those are specific mutations within the genome. This was reported by scientists out of India. They actually presented to us at our virus evolution working group on Monday, giving us some information about the studies that are underway and working in collaboration across the country but also with scientists around the world. 00:29:07 It was first seen in two states at the end of 2020 and there is an increasing proportion of cases of this B617 that have increased since the end of last year. As you know, these virus variants... The virus mutates, the virus changes over time. This is one variant of interest that we are following. Having two of these mutations which have been seen in other variants around the world is concerning because there is a similarity in these mutations which confer increased transmissibility for example and some of these mutations also result in reduced neutralisation, which may have an impact on our countermeasures including the vaccines. What we are doing is working with India and working with countries around the world to make sure that we increase the proportion of sequencing that is happening around the world but making sure that this is intelligent sequencing so that we can detect where these variants of interest and these variants of concern are. But also linking with the sequences epidemiologic information, clinical information so that they can be studied properly. Variants with certain mutations do mean that it can spread more easily which means that if it spreads more easily you will have more cases and if you have more cases it will put more burden on your health system. 00:30:29 So this is one of the ones that we are tracking. It is one of the ones that's on our radar and in doing so it means it's on the radar of people around the world. But we have a system in place and I think what is important is that WHO with partners is bringing together member states, researchers, different networks around the world to make sure that we have a robust monitoring and assessment framework. So it's not just important to say that there's a variant of interest that's been detected. It's really important that that assessment is robust so we understand what each variant of interest and variant of concern means for transmission, for severity and for impacts on diagnostics, therapeutics and vaccines. 00:31:12 That system is being strengthened around the world because right now the variants that have been detected; the vaccines still work against these variants of concern, against severe disease and death and that's really, really important. But we want to have a system in place should there need to be a change in some of our countermeasures going forward and so this is one of the ones that we are looking at, this is one of the ones that we are tracking. Indeed it has been reported in other countries across Asia, across North America but it is something we need better sequencing to better determine where it is circulating. So this is one of the ones that is on our radar in addition to the B117, the variant that was first identified in the United Kingdom, the B1351, which is the variant that was first detected in South Africa, and the P1 variant that was first detected in Japan but is circulating in Brazil and in a number of other countries. CL Thank you very much, Dr Van Kerkhove. The next goes to Catherine Fiancan from France 24. Catherine, please unmute yourself. CA Good morning. Thank you, Christian. Good morning to all of you. My questions are addressed to the Minister of Health, the Honourable Jelta Wong, regarding the situation in his country. I'd like to know what are the major... because he spoke about major challenges; if he could elaborate a little bit more about that. 00:32:43 And I would like to ask him also if they have a TB outbreak over there and how do they organise fighting it and do they have enough PPE and tests and also if they're helped by China, if he could confirm or not, and how he explains the sudden rise in cases. Are there imported cases or is it just an expansion of the cases due to a lack of restrictions at the beginning? Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Catherine, for this one question. Let me hand over to the Honourable Minister, please. JW Thank you very much for your question. Yes, when we first started the lock-downs, when we first got the word that COVID-19 was spreading through the countries and coming towards Papua New Guinea we put some measures in place which were very extreme. We locked down the whole country for 14 days to stop the movement. At the time the word was from everyone, all our donor partners and everybody that the virus moves with people moving so we tried to stop the movement of people. 00:34:22 When we did that we were successful in holding down the numbers. Unfortunately through the end of 2020 we started to feel complacent where our people started to think because our numbers were so low that COVID-19 wasn't in our country. So as everywhere else in the world when they have Christmas, Papua New Guinea is no different. A lot of people move out of the city back to the villages and to the provinces to meet with their families and the lack of the measures at the time - because when we opened it back up we allowed a lot of movement back into the country and it caught us off-guard. Within that Christmas a lot of people were meeting and it blew up in that sense. It also didn't help that I was taken to another Ministry because the numbers were down so when we started to feel a surge was coming back and we'd taken hold of the Government I was put back into the Health Minister's position to revitalise the NCC to ensure that we weren't complacent any more. Our control was put in place and we tried to do the measures the same again but not as strict as we did before. By that time we realised that the community transmission had escalated in such a way that the hospitals were inundated with patients but we've covered the surge. 00:36:24 At the start we weren't doing too well. We were scrambling around trying to ensure that we created hubs where people can go and isolate within their own suburbs or within their own villages. That helped us a bit but we also had the backing of WHO and other donor countries where they sent EMTs from their countries to come and help us work in this emergency situation where complacency in ourselves was the biggest object to why the COVID surge was so big in that time. But as we go through the last couple of weeks the numbers have been slowly declining and with the introduction of the vaccine it's given us a feeling that once we take over the vaccine it gives time for our people to start moving information out to the villages and saying that the vaccine is working. We've had some personal interactions, not scientifically. I'm not a doctor but I personally took the vaccine about three weeks ago. My wife had COVID-19; she was tested positive and I had very small interaction with her within that time. I came out of it and I'd been tested on the day that they said that I went home and a couple of days later when they said the incubation period and all this. 00:38:26 I got tested all through that time and I came out negative. There are more stories like this happening within my country and a lot of people are putting it out now and word of mouth is spreading that the vaccine is there to ensure that people don't get sick. So I'm a big believer in the vaccine and the use of the policies and the stuff that we're putting together to roll out the vaccine will allow us to ensure that people get vaccinated across the country. As I said, I was appreciative to WHO for organising EMTs from other countries to come. This also gives our health workers a bit of training, allowing them to learn from the best from other countries. CL Thank you so much, Honourable Minister, and also for your personal account there. Let me hand now to Ms Anna Maalsen, WHO Acting Representative in Papua New Guinea. 00:39:47 AM Thank you. Thank you for your questions. Papua New Guinea is a very challenging country to deliver health services. For many years the PNG Government and the development partners along with WHO have been really working to strengthen the health system but unfortunately the health system in Papua New Guinea is impacted by many shocks. In 2018 we had a significant earthquake. Across the latter part of 2018 and 19 the country was responding to a polio outbreak and we continue to have the communicable disease burden, the drug-resistant tuberculosis, malaria, HIV and maternal and child health and it's a constant pressure on the system. But a system that has just over 15,000 healthcare workers for a population of 8.5 million in a very geographically challenging country, from the mountains to the oceans and limited road networks and delivery networks to get services across the country. Also the challenge of delivery is impacted by a highly decentralised health system. We have 22 provincial health authorities across the country. It's a really important reform that brings the hospital and rural and primary healthcare services together under one management structure. 00:41:17 However it's been a rolling reform over the last ten years and at the time of COVID-19 and when that arrived in Papua New Guinea the national capital district had only just transitioned to a new provincial health authority so were trying to respond to a pandemic at the same time as almost setting up a new governance system to deliver healthcare. All of these things together make it really challenging and as a country office here immediately we repurposed our staff to help respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. But over time we've been able to recruit and draw on our many global experts, particularly through the global outbreak and response network, GOARN. We have a separate incident management team now supporting the response, which means our core country office staff can continue to support the other critical essential health services and programmes so continuing that support to TB, to maternal and child health so we can really leverage and continue that support across the country. We're also supporting the country with the genome sequencing so that goes through the laboratories in Singapore and also to the Doherty Institute in Australia. 00:42:42 So far there are no variants of concern really that have emerged here and those border protection measures that the Government have put in as a critical part and the quarantine and the point of entry requirements in trying to minimise the risk of importation of any of those variants of concern. Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Anna. I'll move to Akiko Uala from Swiss Info. Akiko, please unmute yourself. AK Morning. I have a question for Director-General Dr Tedros and also Dr Kasai, Director of the Western Pacific Regional Office and Head of the World Health Assembly. It's about information sharing. What measures or reforms do you think the WHO should implement to co-operate better for information sharing between the regional office and WHO and also between the regional office and member states in preparation for future pandemics? Thank you. 00:43:51 CL Thank you very much, Akiko. Let me hand to Dr Kasai, WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific. TK Thank you very much, Akiko, for that question. Let me start in this way; headquarters and the regional office and the country office work as one so under this COVID-19 since January 1st 2020 the three levels have been connected and responding together. We had this system in an informal way but it's become much more systematic as a result of the lessons identified and learned from the Ebola response where we established one programme for WHO emergency programmes led by Dr Mike Ryan under the very strong leadership of the DG. WHO and member states; first and foremost we have a country office within the member states and through the country office we have really regular communications. We're working almost together. In the regional office from time to time we organise regular information sharing with a group of people set up in the member states called international health regulations focal point and also our technical persons who are connected with the technical people in the subject matter. For example surveillance people would be connected with the surveillance group in the country, member state and they work together. 00:45:33 Of course from time to time I reach out to the Ministers in these member states. I'm also happy to report and always appreciate the headquarters also trying to reach out at the global level to all the member states under the leadership of the Director-General. What I have learned from this information sharing is obviously information about the virus is very important but equally the information sharing of the experience of response is so important. Countries can learn from each other, from other countries' experience and through that we've been responding to COVID-19 as we learn and continue to improve. Obviously these kind of things cannot be done without the preparation so it's actually very important that we invest during peacetime. Our region has taken this issue very seriously since SARS in 2003 and we've been working together with the member states to connect each other ourselves to be ready for this pandemic. 00:46:45 Now there's ongoing a lot of evaluations, a review of our response and member states' response and I understand that will be reported on by the coming World Health Assembly in May. I really wanted to work together with the DG and Dr Mike Ryan to make sure those recommendations would go through with the member states and the outcome of the discussions with member states would be reflected in further improving this information sharing within the WHO and between WHO and member states. Thank you very much for that question. CL Thank you very much, Dr Kasai. I see Dr Mike Ryan wants to come in on this. Let me see if we can connect him. Dr Mike Ryan, please. MR Thanks, Christian. My greetings to Takeshi and all the team in WPR and to our team on the ground in PNG. Takeshi-san outlined it very, very well. We are a learning organisation, continuous learning, systematic learning before, during and after our responses. Particularly during responses we have constant operational reviews, intra-action reviews and in fact have helped many countries carry out their own intra-action reviews, as Takeshi has alluded to so learning during and learning after. 00:48:16 Right now we have a number of processes. As you know, we have the IHR review committee, we have the IPP VR, we have the global preparedness monitoring board and we have the independent advisory and oversight committee that works to oversee the operations of the emergency programme inside WHO. I can assure you that we're constantly learning. I would though like to pay tribute to Takeshi and his leadership and the region and the team at regional level in the Western Pacific region. They've been absolutely superb throughout this outbreak and have offered support to a huge range of countries which range from very small Pacific islands to highly industrialised and populated states. It's a challenging and demanding remit and providing operational, technical, epidemiologic and clinical services to countries, as you see with Papua New Guinea now receiving a huge array of support from the international community and again recognising the role particularly that Australia has played as a very strong partner in supporting much of that activity as well. 00:49:19 So the question is well asked; I think we do have to look at how information moves in the system both before, during and after outbreaks. We need to get better at prediction. We need to bring together better data. The data exists out there. We have so much data. Our problem is getting access to it, organising that data in the right way, having the right analytic tools and platforms to do that and building the communities of practice so that each user in the system from the front-line primary healthcare worker all the way through to global epidemiologists and modellers have access to data in real time at the right time before, during and after epidemics. This is going to be a major challenge going forward. We have not invested enough in this function, we have not invested enough in accessing, managing and using data to prevent, to respond to and to recover from pandemics. This is a major focus for WHO going forward and I'm sure the Director-General will be outlining that further and we know the member states are really interested and pushing very hard for a fundamental increase in investment in local, national and global surveillance, data sharing, the sharing of biological materials so we can all do better in future in response to global threats like this. DG. 00:50:43 CL Thank you very much. This was Dr Mike Ryan, Executive Director for WHO's Health Emergencies Programme and we'll have the Director-General to add. TAG Thank you so much. I think Takeshi and Mike have said everything so I don't have anything to add except to thank them and as was said, we will continue to make the system really robust because information is the basis and that's how we can beat the current one and also prepare for the future. It's a learning organisation and we will continue to learn and improve our system. Thank you. CL Thank you all so much. We just have time for one more question and this goes to Marian Benitez from the Hong Kong standard. Marian, please unmute yourself. MA Hello, can you hear me? CL Yes, please go ahead. 00:51:42 MA I'd like to ask you, with this virus spreading even though it's not in PNG but in other countries as well in Asia Pacific, do you think there is hope for a vaccine passport that some countries have been discussing with other countries, like Hong Kong and Singapore are doing now? What is the WHO position on that? Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Marian. Let me look at Dr Van Kerkhove or... Dr Soumya Swaminathan, please. SS Thank you. I can start and I'm sure Dr Ryan would like to add because this is a topic obviously which has been coming up from time to time and we've heard about various initiatives or ideas that countries have proposed. The basic concept of course is that people want to get back to travelling safely; they want to get back to their business travel needs across countries and so on. We need to look at this from the point of view of the scientific rationale behind something like that as well as the other implications which could be equity implications and ethical implications. So for the scientific principle of a vaccine passport I guess what is needed is something that tells you that you are not infected and you're unlikely to infect other people if you're travelling. I think that's the basis. 00:53:20 So some countries have proposed not only immunisation but also, as currently is needed to travel, a molecular test, a PCR test which is negative before you can get on at least an international flight. An antibody test could be another way of showing whether you're protected or not but we haven't got to the point where we have established criteria for antibody levels for example that are protective. In fact we know that vaccines do not protect 100% against infection even though they're very effective against severe disease and hospitalisation. All the vaccines tested so far have been highly efficacious but we're still getting data about the efficacy against infection, asymptomatic infection or infection with very mild symptoms. Some vaccines are showing that they do protect against infection but maybe to the extent of 70 or 80% so we cannot take it for granted that just because somebody's vaccinated that they are absolutely not going to be infected and therefore not be a risk to others so that's the first scientific fact and we're learning more about protection after natural infection, protection after vaccination and this will continue to evolve. 00:54:37 The second very important issue of course is that we've seen currently and the Director-General has repeatedly underlined the inequitable situation of vaccines around the world just now. We heard from PNG as well the need; a population of over eight million and the supplies that they have currently will be enough just to protect the most high-risk and vulnerable groups. Many countries; we know that while some countries have vaccinated over 30, 40% of their adult populations others have barely reached 1% or even less; many countries are at even less than that. So this is not something that can be applied globally right now; it's just not possible because not enough people have had the vaccine and of course this is going to change; it's going to get better and as the year goes on hopefully much larger proportions of people across the world will have access to vaccination. 00:55:31 So at this point the emergency committee also is the committee that advises WHO on travel regulations and we are waiting for the latest guidance from the meeting that was just held but the position will continue to evolve as the science evolves. But at this point we have to be really very careful when we discuss the idea of the vaccine passport and what exactly we mean when we talk about the vaccine passport. If it's a record and what we are recommending is that all individuals who get vaccines have a record. This can be a digital record and we have produced the technical standards for what this record looks like; a smart vaccination card or a digital card, move from paper to digital. That's good for everyone; it's good for countries' and systems' immunisation programmes and it's also good for individuals who don't have to carry a paper around with them but that's very different from making it mandatory for someone to have a certificate in order to travel. That's where the problems really start coming up and we have to think very carefully about it. Thanks. I don't know if Mike wants to add, or the DG. 00:56:47 CL Thank you very much, Dr Swaminathan. We'll have Dr Mike Ryan, please. MR I think Soumya covered it extremely well. I think Soumya said something very significant there; we want people to keep a record of vaccination and we want countries to keep a record of who they vaccinate so having a record in paper terms or in a booklet or a digital record on your phone of your vaccination status is good for you, that's good for your health and it's good for the authorities to know who's been vaccinated in any given country for planning purposes. That's very different to what that document or what that certificate is then used for. Is that document going to be used so you can access or not access your workplace or access or not access international travel or access or not access university education? That raises many issues, as Soumya said; ethical issues, equity issues as well and they do need to be considered, especially in a world where vaccine is distributed in such a grossly inequitous way. The other issue here is that a vaccination card does not necessarily tell you anything other than a vaccine has been administered and we know these vaccines are highly effective and therefore having a vaccination card is very likely to represent your immunity. 00:58:03 But, as Soumya said, not necessarily preventing you from transmitting the disease although the evidence is growing that it has a big impact. But there's also your immunity status; we've heard this before; your antibodies. You could have had a natural infection and have antibodies even though you weren't vaccinated. Currently many of us are subjected to infection tests, antigen tests, rapid tests and PCR tests. They test whether you actually have the virus up your nose or in your respiratory tract or not so there are different types of tests for your infection status, your immunity status and your vaccination status. All of that does need to be brought together into a more coherent framework so this information can be used by individuals and governments but used properly and with proper moral and ethical considerations. 00:58:52 The emergency committee has been considering their advice around the use of vaccination certification as a prerequisite for travel and they will be advising the DG in the coming hours and days as to whether their previous advice would change at this point. Their previous advice up to their meeting yesterday was, they advised that certification of vaccination should not be used as a prerequisite for international travel but they said they would keep that under review and they have been reviewing that again yesterday. Thank you. CL Thank you very much, Dr Ryan. With this we are coming to the end of today's session on COVID-19. I'll ask the Honourable Minister of Papua New Guinea, Jelta Wong, for any closing remarks, please. Honourable Minister, you seem to be muted. JW Thank you, Christian. On behalf of my Government of Papua New Guinea I want to thank WHO, Anna Maalsen and her team, Takeshi-san and his team in the Philippines, in Manila and especially to the Director-General for your continued support for our country. 01:00:30 Even though we still have a long way to go we still work on trying to get all our health programmes in place. It's only been a year when we've really sat down and had a closer look at our health system and we're using COVID to ensure that we build a bigger, better health system within our country. Your support has been very much appreciated through the years and I hope going into the future that we start to build a relationship that will build lasting infrastructure as well as keeping the world safe by helping and always being with you all. We really appreciate it and goodnight. CL Thank you so much, Honourable Minister. Let me thank the guests, the Honourable Minister, Jelta Wong, Minister of Health of Papua New Guinea, Dr Takeshi Kasai, WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific, and Ms Anna Maalsen, the Acting Representative for WHO in Papua New Guinea. Before I hand over to the Director-General for closing remarks let me remind you we'll be sending you the audio files and Dr Tedros' remarks right after this press briefing. The full transcript will be posted tomorrow on WHO's website. For any further questions please don't hesitate to contact mediaenquiries@who.int. Dr Tedros, the floor is yours. 01:02:10 TAG Thank you. Thank you very much, Christian. Takeshi, if you have any closing remarks, please. Then I will say a few words after you. TK Thanks, DG. Just one more; really thank you very much for the opportunity to share the information on Papua New Guinea and also the Pacific broadly. Thank you very much. TAG Thank you, Takeshi, arigato gozaimasu and thank you, Your Excellency, Minister Jelta Wong for joining us today. We're in this together to end this pandemic and also, Minister, as you said, to continue to work together to build infrastructure, to build universal health coverage so I look forward to working with you very, very closely and thank you also, Takeshi and Anna, for joining us. I would also like to thank the media for joining us and all my colleagues here. I wish you all a nice weekend. Bon week-end. 01:03:19