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ECDC and EMCDDA have joined forces to identify key interventions to address infectious diseases among people who inject drugs.

Nearly 1 in 3 deaths from non-melanoma skin cancer is caused by working under the sun, according to joint estimates by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO) published today. The research released in Environment International finds that outdoor workers carry a large and increasing burden of non-melanoma skin cancer and calls for action to prevent this serious workplace hazard and the loss of workers’ lives it causes.

The World Health Organization (WHO) 2023 Global tuberculosis (TB) report underscores a significant worldwide recovery in the scale-up of TB diagnosis and treatment services in 2022. It shows an encouraging trend starting to reverse the detrimental effects of COVID- 19 disruptions on TB services.

From 1 January–24 October 2023, 335 laboratory-confirmed Salmonella Enteritidis ST11 cases belonging to three distinct microbiological clusters have been reported in 14 EU/EEA countries, the United Kingdom and the United States, affecting all age groups.

Between January and October 2023, 14 EU/EEA countries, the UK and the US reported 335 cases related to this outbreak.

This report provides an overview of the total number of cases of mpox (monkeypox) reported to ECDC and the WHO Regional Office for Europe through IHR/EWRS mechanisms .

Gravely concerned by the humanitarian and health situation facing approximately 200 people, including health workers and up to 30 children, abducted from Israel by Hamas and other armed groups on 7 October 2023, the World Health Organization today reiterated its call for the immediate release of all the hostages, along with urgent access to each of them and delivery of medical care.

The call was made by WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus following discussions today with an Israeli non-governmental organization, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, that represents families of the abducted people.

“We met today with families of people abducted from southern Israel on 7 October and heard firsthand the tragedy, trauma and suffering they are facing,” said Dr Tedros. “There is an urgent need for the captors of the hostages to provide signs of life, proof of provision of health care and the immediate release, on humanitarian and health grounds, of all those abducted.”

“Many of the hostages, including children, women and the elderly, have pre-existing health conditions requiring urgent and sustained care and treatment. The mental health trauma that the abducted, and the families, are facing is acute and psychosocial support is of great importance.”

Dr Tedros said the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) should be granted immediate access to the hostages to understand their health status. WHO stands ready to provide the ICRC, which is mandated to provide support to hostages in conflict situations, with any health support for the hostages, Dr Tedros added.

“I thank the families for sharing their heartbreaking stories. I committed, on behalf of WHO, to do all we can to support the health and humanitarian needs of those being held captive. All civilians who are suffering in this conflict must be protected.”

Dr Tedros added: “We will do everything in our power as WHO to protect and promote the health of all people as that is the mission of our Organization: to care for each and everybody’s health no matter the conditions and circumstances,” said Dr Tedros. “We call on WHO Member States, humanitarian partners, all other relevant parties, and the public at large to put the health of people first and foremost in their minds and take immediate action to end the ongoing suffering.”

 

ECDC and World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe have jointly developed the European Respiratory Virus Surveillance Summary (ERVISS), an interactive surveillance data dashboard for influenza, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) that also features a weekly epidemiological summary.

A first, but limited, shipment of life-saving humanitarian supplies from the United Nations and the Egyptian Red Crescent entered Gaza today on 20 trucks, passing through the Rafah Crossing.

It will provide an urgently needed lifeline to some of the hundreds of thousands of civilians, mostly women and children, who have been cut off from water, food, medicine, fuel  and other essentials. But it is only a small beginning and far from enough. More than 1.6 million people in Gaza are in critical need of humanitarian aid. Children, pregnant women and the elderly remain the most vulnerable. Nearly half of Gaza’s population are children.

With so much civilian infrastructure in Gaza damaged or destroyed in nearly two weeks of constant bombings, including shelters, health facilities, water, sanitation, and electrical systems, time is running out before mortality rates could skyrocket due to disease outbreaks and lack of health-care capacity. 

Hospitals are overwhelmed with casualties. Civilians face mounting challenges in accessing essential food supplies. Health facilities no longer have fuel and are running on small amounts they have secured locally. These are expected to run out in the next day or so. Water production capacity is at 5 per cent of normal levels. Pre-positioned humanitarian supplies have already been depleted. Vulnerable people are at greatest risk and children are dying at an alarming rate and being denied their right to protection, food, water and health care. 

Nearly one-third of the population of Palestine was food insecure before this conflict in Gaza. Today stocks in shops are nearly exhausted and bakeries are closing, while tens of thousands of people are displaced and unable to cook or safely purchase food. 

We call for a humanitarian ceasefire, along with immediate, unrestricted humanitarian access throughout Gaza to allow humanitarian actors to reach civilians in need, save lives and prevent further human suffering. Flows of humanitarian aid must be at scale and sustained, and allow all Gazans to preserve their dignity.

We call for safe and sustained access to water, food, health – including sexual and reproductive health – and fuel, which is necessary to enable essential services.

We call for the protection of all civilians and civilian infrastructure in Gaza, including health-care facilities.

We call for the protection of humanitarian workers in Gaza who are risking their lives in the service of others. 

And we call for the utmost respect of international humanitarian law by all parties.

Gaza was a desperate humanitarian situation before the most recent hostilities. It is now catastrophic. The world must do more.

WHO Director-General Dr Tedros greets EU Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations Director-General Maciej Popowski. ©WHO/Chris Black

Top representatives of WHO and its Health Emergency Programme (WHE) and the European Commission’s Directorate General for Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO) met today in Geneva for their annual high-level dialogue.

The EU team was led by Mr Michael Köhler, Deputy Director-General of DG ECHO, who was accompanied by Ms Susanne Mallaun, Head of Unit, Strategic Partnerships with Humanitarian Organizations, and Ms Dana Le Roy, WHO desk officer at ECHO, with representatives of the EU Delegation to the United Nations in Geneva.

Exchange on health emergency preparedness and response topped the agenda, as delegates discussed shared global health priorities and partnership in health emergencies and humanitarian response. The partners also brainstormed about strategic developments related to the WHO fourteenth General Programme of Work (GPW14), which is presently under development, and also discussed the negotiations underway for a Pandemic Accord, the European Humanitarian response capacity, progress with key partnership projects, including on mental health and nutrition, joint health emergency and epidemic response in humanitarian settings.

While the COVID-19 pandemic has brought both organizations closer together, at strategic, technical and operational levels, the high-level dialogue participants agree that the ECHO-WHO partnership has grown even stronger post-pandemic, with a shared strategic vision for a better, safer, healthier world.

This partnership with ECHO is critical to WHO’s health emergency operations. In 2023, WHO is responding to an unprecedented number of intersecting health emergencies: climate change-related disasters; disasters such as earthquakes; the health impact of conflicts in Ukraine, Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory and in other regions. The impacts of all these health emergencies has overlapped with the health system disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Together, ECHO and WHO are responding to epidemic outbreaks and health emergencies around the world, delivering life-saving health care to the most vulnerable. Mr Michael Köhler, Deputy Director-General of DG ECHO, said that "demands on WHO have increased exponentially over the past years, showing the trust that partners have placed in WHO."

Dr Michael Ryan, Executive Director, WHO Health Emergencies Programme, said: "The global context is complex with a deteriorating environment, increasing health emergencies risk, and escalating health needs straining health systems and health workforce across all countries. WHO is keen to expand partnership with ECHO beyond short term humanitarian response into longer term, strategic joint priorities."

The European Union and WHO collaborate to safeguard political support by keeping global health on the world post-pandemic agenda. The vision for WHO is to rally stakeholders around the new strategy for the work, encapsulated in the Global Programme of Work, and to turn the tide on SDG 3: good health and well-being.

The dialogue took place in the context of shared political commitment at the highest levels: the WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus welcomed to Geneva Mr Maciej Popowski, ECHO’s Director-General. This was their first one-to-one meeting, at which they spoke at length about their shared commitment to serve the most vulnerable in emergencies and humanitarian crises, with Dr Tedros expressing appreciation of their close partnership and joint efforts to alleviate the suffering across on-going crises in Afghanistan, Sudan, Ukraine and most recently in Israel and the Gaza Strip.

In 2022, ECHO provided support to COVID-19 rapid response teams, isolation centres, laboratories and primary health care centres and also provided ambulances to health authorities in Khartoum, Sudan, to help with transporting patients to health facilities within localities. ©Lindsay Mackenzie

WHO has released a core package of 13 interventions to guide country prioritization when developing, implementing and monitoring national action plans on antimicrobial resistance (AMR). The interventions address the needs and barriers people and patients face when accessing health services through a people-centred approach to AMR.

Globally, AMR is one of the leading causes of death responsible for approximately 1.27 million deaths and associated with 4.95 million deaths in 2019.1 Failing to address AMR will have significant economic consequences with an estimated cost to the world’s economy of US$ 100 trillion by 2050.2 While over 170 countries have developed national action plans on AMR, implementation remains fragmented and siloed, and greater political commitment and investment is needed.

Building on the Global Action Plan for AMR, the WHO people-centred approach and core package aims to shift the narrative of AMR to place the needs of people and system barriers at the centre, and enhance AMR awareness and understanding among policy-makers and the general public. It also supports a more programmatic and comprehensive response to AMR at the country level underpinning the importance of equitable and affordable access to quality health services for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of drug-resistant infections.

The people-centred core package of AMR interventions

“AMR is a global public health and socio-economic priority. This practical set of interventions, based on the need for a strong people-centred response in the human health sector, will greatly contribute to One Health actions under the umbrella of multisectoral national action plans on AMR,” said Kitty Van Weezenbeek, Director Surveillance Prevention and Control, WHO AMR Division.

The document also stresses the importance of engaging civil society and community organizations, private sector and academia in the development and implementation of the national action plan on AMR. It highlights opportunities for integrating the AMR response in primary health care policies and programmes as well as health emergency preparedness and response efforts. “This package helps policy-makers identify synergies with broader health sector programmes, ensuring efficiency and the sustainability of actions on AMR,” noted Anand Balachandran, Unit Head National Action Plans and Monitoring in WHO AMR Division.

Overall, the people-centred approach is designed to ensure equitable, affordable access to good-quality preventive services, timely diagnosis, appropriate treatment and care of (resistant) infections to reduce the impact of AMR on patients in terms of morbidity and mortality, while leaving no one behind and contributing to the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals.

 

References:

1. Antimicrobial Resistance Collaborators. Global burden of bacterial antimicrobial resistance in 2019: a systematic analysis. Lancet 2022; 399(10325): 629-55.

2. Jonas OBI, Alec; Berthe,Franck Cesar Jean; Le Gall,Francois G.; Marquez,Patricio V.. Drug-resistant infections : a threat to our economic future. 2017; 2.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released its 2023 Essential Diagnostics List (EDL), which is an evidence-based register of in vitro diagnostics (IVD) that supports countries to make national diagnostic choices.

This year’s list includes two firsts:

• Inclusion of three tests for hepatitis E virus (HEV), including a rapid test to aid in the diagnosis and surveillance of HEV infection; and
• Advice to include personal use glucose monitoring devices along with the medical recommendations for diabetes already in existence. 

Hepatitis E occurs around the world both as outbreaks and as sporadic cases. While most people recover completely, a small proportion (up to 4%) develop acute liver failure, which is higher in pregnant women (mortality rates 19.3-63.6%).  Hepatitis E infection is under-reported and the addition of these diagnostics will support governments to manage outbreaks.

Diabetes is a chronic disease causing 1.5 million deaths in 2019 with higher disease incidence and impact in lower-middle-income countries. The disease consequence can be avoided or delayed with diet, physical activity, medication and regular glucose monitoring. Including personal glucose testing devices on the Essential Diagnostics List could lead to better disease management and reduced negative outcomes.

While not prescriptive, the Essential Diagnostics List has the potential to help countries with their plans to improve access to in vitro diagnostics by providing a policy framework to enable informed decision-making for national Essential Diagnostics Lists. The ambition is that governments can use the List to improve in vitro diagnostics testing services in their country which will translate into increased access to diagnostics and better patient outcomes.

“The rapid development and global deployment of diagnostics early in the COVID-19 pandemic was vital in tracking the spread of the virus, detecting, isolating and treating those infected and protecting those at risk,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “The WHO Essential Diagnostics List is a critical tool that gives countries evidence-based recommendations to guide local decisions to ensure the most important and reliable diagnostics are available to health workers and patients.”

For the 2023 Essential Diagnostics List, the WHO Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on in vitro diagnostics (SAGE IVD) reviewed 12 applications and recommended the addition of eight in IVDs and several edits to previously listed EDL tests, including IVDs for tuberculosis, HIV and diabetes mellitus. 

Other new tests added to the list include those for endocrine disorders; reproductive, maternal and new-born health; and cardiovascular health:

• For endocrine disorders, two new tests were included: Parathyroid hormone as a laboratory-based test to aid in the evaluation of the causes of calcium homeostasis disorders and monitor the effects of treatment; and 17-Hydroxyprogesterone as a laboratory-based test to diagnose and monitor congenital adrenal hyperplasia outside of the neonatal period;
• For reproductive, maternal and newborn health, the inclusion of two tests: Kleihauer-Betke acid-elution test as a general IVD for use in clinical laboratories to aid in the diagnosis and treatment of fetomaternal haemorrhage, and a point-of-care test to determine blood groups and Rhesus factor in the context of maternal health care and haemolytic disease of the fetus and newborn;
• For cardiovascular health, the inclusion of high-sensitivity troponin I and T to aid in the diagnosis of acute myocardial infarction in health care facilities with clinical laboratories.

With the recent adoption of the WHA 76.5 resolution on strengthening diagnostics capacity, Member States are urged to consider the establishment of national diagnostics strategies as part of their national health plans, and to consider the development of national essential diagnostics lists, adapting the WHO model list of essential in vitro diagnostics.  WHO is advising and supporting multiple countries across the world on their efforts to develop EDLs, through webinars, workshops and direct country support.

Updated biennially, the Essential Diagnostics List is intended to support national in vitro diagnostics policy development and to improve access to IVD testing and clinical laboratory services. As well as informing national EDLs, it provides advice on prioritization of IVDs at different levels of the healthcare system. Additionally, it informs United Nations agencies and non-government organizations that support the selection, procurement, supply or donation of In Vitro Diagnostics along with guidance to the private health technology and manufacturing sectors about the IVDs priorities required to address global health issues.

For detailed information on the 2023 WHO EDL and decisions see link.

 

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a new publication listing key regulatory considerations on artificial intelligence (AI) for health. The publication emphasizes the importance of establishing AI systems’ safety and effectiveness, rapidly making appropriate systems available to those who need them, and fostering dialogue among stakeholders, including developers, regulators, manufacturers, health workers, and patients.

With the increasing availability of health care data and the rapid progress in analytic techniques – whether machine learning, logic-based or statistical – AI tools could transform the health sector. WHO recognizes the potential of AI in enhancing health outcomes by strengthening clinical trials; improving medical diagnosis, treatment, self-care and person-centred care; and supplementing health care professionals’ knowledge, skills and competencies. For example, AI could be beneficial in settings with a lack of medical specialists, e.g. in interpreting retinal scans and radiology images among many others.

However, AI technologies – including large language models – are being rapidly deployed, sometimes without a full understanding of how they may perform, which could either benefit or harm end-users, including health-care professionals and patients. When using health data, AI systems could have access to sensitive personal information, necessitating robust legal and regulatory frameworks for safeguarding privacy, security, and integrity, which this publication aims to help set up and maintain.

“Artificial intelligence holds great promise for health, but also comes with serious challenges, including unethical data collection, cybersecurity threats and amplifying biases or misinformation,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “This new guidance will support countries to regulate AI effectively, to harness its potential, whether in treating cancer or detecting tuberculosis, while minimising the risks.” 

In response to growing country needs to responsibly manage the rapid rise of AI health technologies, the publication outlines six areas for regulation of AI for health.

• To foster trust, the publication stresses the importance of transparency and documentation, such as through documenting the entire product lifecycle and tracking development processes.
• For risk management, issues like ‘intended use’, ‘continuous learning’, human interventions, training models and cybersecurity threats must all be comprehensively addressed, with models made as simple as possible.
• Externally validating data and being clear about the intended use of AI helps assure safety and facilitate regulation.
• A commitment to data quality, such as through rigorously evaluating systems pre-release, is vital to ensuring systems do not amplify biases and errors.
• The challenges posed by important, complex regulations – such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) in the United States of America – are addressed with an emphasis on understanding the scope of jurisdiction and consent requirements, in service of privacy and data protection.
• Fostering collaboration between regulatory bodies, patients, healthcare professionals, industry representatives, and government partners, can help ensure products and services stay compliant with regulation throughout their lifecycles.

AI systems are complex and depend not only on the code they are built with but also on the data they are trained on, which come from clinical settings and user interactions – for example. Better regulation can help manage the risks of AI amplifying biases in training data. 

For example, it can be difficult for AI models to accurately represent the diversity of populations, leading to biases, inaccuracies or even failure. To help mitigate these risks, regulations can be used to ensure that the attributes – such as gender, race and ethnicity – of the people featured in the training data are reported and datasets are intentionally made representative. 

The new WHO publication aims to outline key principles that governments and regulatory authorities can follow to develop new guidance or adapt existing guidance on AI at national or regional levels.  

WHO strongly condemns the attack on Al Ahli Arab Hospital in the north of the Gaza Strip. The hospital was operational, with patients, health and care givers, and internally displaced people sheltering there. Early reports indicate hundreds of fatalities and injuries.

The hospital was one of 20 in the north of the Gaza Strip facing evacuation orders from the Israeli military. The order for evacuation has been impossible to carry out given the current insecurity, critical condition of many patients, and lack of ambulances, staff, health system bed capacity, and alternative shelter for those displaced.

WHO calls for the immediate active protection of civilians and health care. Evacuation orders must be reversed. International humanitarian law must be abided by, which means health care must be actively protected and never targeted.

As the United Nation’s agency responsible for public health, the World Health Organization (WHO) strongly condemns Israel's repeated orders for the evacuation of 22 hospitals treating more than 2000 inpatients in northern Gaza. The forced evacuation of patients and health workers will further worsen the current humanitarian and public health catastrophe.

The lives of many critically ill and fragile patients hang in the balance: those in intensive care or who rely on life support; patients undergoing hemodialysis; newborns in incubators; women with complications of pregnancy, and others all face imminent deterioration of their condition or death if they are forced to move and are cut off from life-saving medical attention while being evacuated. 

Health facilities in northern Gaza continue to receive an influx of injured patients and are struggling to operate beyond maximum capacity. Some patients are being treated in corridors and outdoors in surrounding streets due to a lack of hospital beds. 

Forcing more than 2000 patients to relocate to southern Gaza, where health facilities are already running at maximum capacity and unable to absorb a dramatic rise in the number of patients, could be tantamount to a death sentence. 

Hospital directors and health workers are now facing an agonizing choice: abandon critically ill patients amid a bombing campaign, put their own lives at risk while remaining on site to treat patients, or endanger their patients’ lives while attempting to transport them to facilities that have no capacity to receive them. Overwhelmingly, caregivers have chosen to stay behind, and honor their oaths as health professionals to “do no harm,” rather than risk moving their critically ill patients during evacuations. Health workers should never have to make such impossible choices.

Additionally, tens of thousands of displaced people in northern Gaza are seeking refuge in open spaces in or around hospitals, treating them as havens from violence as well as to protect the facilities from potential attacks. Their lives, too, are at risk when health facilities are bombed.

There are verified reports of deaths of health care workers and destruction of health facilities, which denies civilians the basic human right of life-saving health care and is prohibited under International Humanitarian Law.

WHO calls for Israel to immediately reverse evacuation orders to hospitals in northern Gaza, and calls for the protection of health facilities, health workers, patients, and civilians. WHO also reiterates its calls for the immediate and safe delivery of medical supplies, fuel, clean water, food, and other humanitarian aid into Gaza through the Rafah crossing, where life-saving assistance – including WHO health supplies that arrived earlier today – is currently awaiting entry. 

On Friday 13 October 2023, a team of experts from the European Commission (EC), the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), two EU Member States (Spain and Finland), the Integrated Quality Laboratory Services (IQLS), and Epiconcept finished a joint one-week visit to Kosovo* on One-Health approaches against AMR.

WHO joins the wider United Nations in appealing to Israel to immediately rescind orders for the evacuation of over 1 million people living north of Wadi Gaza. A mass evacuation would be disastrous—for patients, health workers and other civilians left behind or caught in the mass movement.

With ongoing airstrikes and closed borders, civilians have no safe place to go. Almost half of the population of Gaza is under 18 years of age. With dwindling supplies of safe food, clean water, health services, and without adequate shelter, children and adults, including the elderly, will all be at heightened risk of disease.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health has informed WHO that it is impossible to evacuate vulnerable hospital patients without endangering their lives. Vulnerable patients include those who are critically injured or dependent on life support. Moving them amid hostilities puts their lives at immediate risk.

The two Ministry of Health hospitals in the North of Gaza that continue to be operational, have greatly exceeded their combined 760-bed capacity with severe overcrowding. Of the thousands of patients with injuries and other conditions receiving care in hospitals, there are hundreds that are severely wounded and over 100 who require critical care. These are the sickest of the sick. Many thousands more, also with wounds or other health needs, cannot access any kind of care.

The compressed timeframe, complex transport logistics, damaged roads, and, above all, lack of supportive care during transport all add to the difficulty of moving them.

Furthermore, the four Ministry of Health hospitals in the south of Gaza are already at or beyond capacity, and lack the critical care capacity and supplies needed to treat additional patients.

The lack of medical supplies is already endangering patients and hampering health workers. Supplies which WHO had pre-positioned in Gaza have mostly been consumed.

On 9 October, WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who agreed to a WHO request to facilitate the delivery of health and other humanitarian supplies from WHO to Gaza via the Rafah crossing.

WHO has prepared medical supplies in its logistics hub in Dubai and is ready to deliver them to Areesh, Egypt—just 20 minutes from Rafah—as soon as landing permit is received. The supplies would be enough to care for more than 300,000 patients with a range of wounds and diseases.

WHO asks for the immediate establishment of a humanitarian corridor for their onward, safe delivery to health care facilities in Gaza, including via Rafah.

WHO reiterates its plea for humanitarian access for life-saving supplies and the delivery of fuel, water, and food; for protection under international humanitarian law for civilians, health workers and health infrastructure; and ultimately, for an end to hostilities and violence.

 

 

From 25 September to 13 October 2023, ECDC delivered a three-week introductory course for ECDC Fellowship programme (EPIET and EUPHEM paths), MediPIET and Postgraduate Training for Applied Epidemiology (PAE) fellows.

France has released its Global Health Strategy for 2023-2027, in Lyon today, in the presence of three French Ministers, the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, the Minister of Health and Prevention, the Minister of Higher Education and Research, and WHO’s Director-General.

As a lead player for shaping global health policies, France has called on national and international stakeholders to support building a new global health architecture towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and in particular SDG3, focused on ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all, at all ages.

The new Health Strategy aims to help reduce health inequalities and strengthen the One Health approach to better prevent and prepare for future global health emergencies. It urges the global community to address the health consequences of climate change and the environmental impact on health systems.

To underscore WHO’s and France strong collaboration and in recognition of France’s pivotal global health role, Dr Tedros travelled to France to join the launch event.

“France was a founding member of WHO in 1948 and has been a strong friend to WHO throughout the 75 years since then,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “As one of the world’s largest economies, France has a critical role to play in global health, and the new Global Health Strategy will enhance that role. It aligns well with WHO’s priorities to promote, provide, protect, empower and perform for health.”

France shares key health priorities with WHO, adopting a crosscutting approach and prioritizing universal health coverage (UHC) as part of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. France also provides support for transformative initiatives at WHO such as the WHO Academy and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) which the Ministers visited today.

Dr Tedros addressed the audiences at the Academy and IARC together with Ms Catherine Colonna, Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Mr Aurélien Rousseau, Minister of Health and Prevention, and Ms Sylvie Retailleau, Minister of Higher Education and Research.

"The World Health Organization, whose 74th anniversary we are celebrating today, must continue to play a central and driving role,” said Ms Catherine Colonna, the French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs. “France will continue to support the WHO and its ambitious governance and financing reforms."

"France is also committed alongside the WHO Academy through several partnership with universities, research institutes, and public health institutions," remarked Sylvie Retailleau, Minister of Higher Education and Research. "Our goal is to enrich the learners' experience through a diversified training portfolio within the Academy."

"The launch of this Global Health Strategy is the perfect opportunity to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the WHO. The Organization plays a central role in global health, and we must continue to support it," said Mr Aurélien Rousseau, Minister of Health and Prevention. "This is why, I am announcing today, France is keen to host, in the first quarter of 2024, in partnership with the WHO, the first international financing conference for the fight against meningitis."

The 2023-2027 French Strategy for Global Health is the fruit of collaboration involving a wide range of French actors: public agencies, civil society organizations, higher education and research organizations, scientific institutions, foundations, organizations of human, animal and environmental health specialists, local government bodies and the private sector. They will all be represented within a monitoring committee to track the Strategy’s implementation and progress.

From left to right: Minister of Health and Prevention H.E. Aurélien Rousseau, WHO’s Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs H.E. Catherine Colonna, and Minister of Higher Education and Research, H.E. Sylvie Retailleau.

Every month ECDC provides detailed epidemiological overview of the worldwide transmission of chikungunya in its weekly threat report (Communicable Diseases Threat Report).