Society

Despite progress, if the world were faced with a pandemic again, some scientists say it would face the “same weaknesses and vulnerabilities” as it did in 2020, at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

The head of the WHO (World Health Organization), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the world was “more or less prepared” to better manage health crisis situations. “If the next pandemic were to occur today, the world would still face some of the same weaknesses and vulnerabilities. But it has also learned many painful lessons from the pandemic and taken important steps to strengthen its defenses,” he said. 

For her part, Maria Van Kerkhove, the American epidemiologist who heads the WHO's Department of Epidemic and Pandemic Prevention and Preparedness, emphasized that “many things have improved thanks to the 2009 influenza pandemic (H1N1, ed. note), but also thanks to Covid”. More skeptically, she added: “But I don't think the world is ready for another pandemic or mass epidemic."

For the group of independent experts in charge of pandemic preparedness and response set up by the WHO, it's clear: “In 2025, the world won't be ready to combat a new pandemic threat,” due to persistent inequalities in access to funding and to the tools needed to combat pandemics, including vaccines. 

The WHO's new Pandemic Prevention Centre in Berlin, which opened in 2021, is dedicated to gathering information to better identify threats and mitigate their impact. Created in 2022, the World Bank's Pandemic Fund has, to date, approved funding worth $885 million, allocated to nearly 50 projects covering 75 countries, reports 20 Minutes. 

While WHO has decided to establish an agreement not only on pandemic prevention, but also on how to tackle them, in order to avoid the mistakes made at Covid, some questions remain... What will happen to the sharing of data on emerging pathogens? What about vaccines, treatments and tests? In May 2025, the consensus must be reached. 

(MH with AsD - Source : 20 Minutes - Illustration : Unsplash)