Excellencies,
A very good afternoon.
I first want to thank you for making your time available. I understand you are all very busy. As the crisis evolves, our partnership is more important than ever. I am committed to ensuring WHO provides you its strongest support.
The pandemic continues to accelerate. Globally, there are now almost 900 000 confirmed cases. The death toll is nearing 50 000.
For more than two and a half months you have held the virus at bay. It was only by 19 March that the Region registered a cumulative 1000 cases.
By 24 March, however, that number had almost doubled, to just below 2000. Five days later it was more than 3000. By 30 March it was more than 4000.
I appreciate the difficult decisions many countries in the Region have made in recent days and weeks, including to implement unprecedented physical distancing measures. For several countries, we should start to see the impact of those measures by mid-to-late next week.
As you strive to increase health system capacity, WHO will continue to support all countries to take the fight to the virus. With the right approach, the virus can be contained. In areas where community transmission occurs, it can be controlled and suppressed.
Every case, cluster and evidence of community transmission must be aggressively responded to. Basic public health measures such as active case detection, isolation, testing, treatment and contact tracing are among our most powerful tools.
To date, WHO has focused on several key areas of support.
First, disseminating accurate and timely information to Member States.
Second, strengthening Member State readiness to respond through the development of national preparedness and response plans.
Third, providing Member States supplies and equipment, including personal protective equipment (PPE) and laboratory diagnostics.
Fourth, training Member State health workers on how to detect, prevent, respond to and control the outbreak.
Fifth, leading a system-wide UN Crisis Management Team to help Member States tackle the outbreak.
Sixth, working with UN agencies and partners to develop strategic preparedness and response plans to support Member States.
And seventh, coordinating global work on surveillance and contact tracing, epidemiology, modelling, diagnostics, clinical care and treatment, and other ways to help Member States identify, manage and limit onward transmission.
We have made important progress in several areas.
As I wrote earlier this week, the Regional Office has released resources and set up inter-disciplinary groups that will help you implement your national preparedness and response plans. The needs of several countries are highly specific, and I thank you for your rapid action in identifying and communicating them.
For countries whose plan is not yet costed, I look forward to receiving an update so that we can understand and support your funding needs. We have so far allocated US$ 25.3 million to countries in the Region.
Partners are also looking to support you. To help them do that, the UN has created an online Partners Platform that matches country needs with available resources. The Platform will enable you to monitor all financial support to the response, whether implemented through the Ministry, the UN or any other partner.
I request you to please identify a focal point in your Ministry to manage the Platform. My Office will provide additional information as required.
Before we discuss each country’s situation and needs, I want to first address an issue that is pertinent to all countries: the lack of essential commodities such as PPE for health workers and laboratory testing kits.
This is of course a global problem, and one that will have a significant impact on the response. If we cannot protect health workers, and are unable to adequately test, we will be fighting with one arm tied.
WHO has so far shipped around 2 million individual PPE items to 74 countries globally. We have provided almost all countries in the Region PPE and laboratory equipment and will continue to do our best to bring you the supplies you need.
At last week’s G20 meeting, WHO D-G Dr Tedros called on the group to ramp up funding and production of PPE for health workers, which it responded to positively. WHO will continue to work with the Pandemic Supply Chain Network to ensure all at-risk and critically affected countries are supported. I appreciate your needs and will do all I can to support you.
You may be aware that WHO has now produced a set of guidelines to help countries balance the demands of responding directly to COVID-19 while maintaining essential health services.
The guidelines include a set of targeted, immediate actions to reorganize and maintain access to high-quality essential health services, including routine vaccination; care during pregnancy and childbirth; treatment for infectious and noncommunicable diseases and mental health conditions; blood services, and more.
Our WRs and country staff will support you to implement the guidelines across programme areas. All countries have made incredible progress in recent years, which we must vigorously protect and defend.
I am aware that several of our countries have issued their own set of guidelines. I request you to share them with us so that we can set up a regional repository to help learn from one another.
Before I give the floor, I take this opportunity to commend countries in the Region for participating in the WHO Solidarity trial. To date, India, Indonesia and Thailand have signed up to the multi-country trial, which will compare the safety and effectiveness of four different drugs or drug combinations against COVID-19.
It is a historic undertaking that will dramatically reduce the time needed to generate robust evidence about what drugs are effective in treating COVID-19. The more countries that join, the faster we will have the results. I urge all countries to sign up.
I am also pleased to share that WHO is in the process of launching a second protocol for the Solidarity trial that will focus on sero-surveillance. This second protocol will help countries establish the incidence and prevalence of infection and the future behaviour of the virus.
For both trials, the Regional Office will facilitate your participation as and where requested.
With that, I thank Your Excellencies once again, and look forward to hearing how best WHO can continue to support you.