COVID-19 pandemic has shown humanity
at its best – and at its worst
By Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus
GENEVA, Feb 11, 2021 (IPS) –
WHO and UNICEF have a long,
deep and very special relationship.
Neither of us could do what
we do without the other.
UNICEF’s success is WHO’s
success, and we are proud to be
your partner on so many issues:
Ebola, polio, maternal health,
nutrition, infection prevention
and control, primary health care
– the list is long.
Never has our partnership
been more important than it is
now. The COVID-19 pandemic
has changed our world in ways we
could never have imagined when
it started just over a year ago.
It’s sobering to think that on
this day 12 months ago, more
than 3000 new cases of COVID-19
were reported to WHO. Yesterday,
3000 cases were reported every
15 minutes. The pandemic has
held a mirror up to our world. It
has shown humanity at its best
and worst.
It has exposed and exploited
the fault lines, inequalities,
injustices and contradictions of
our world, within and between
countries. The pandemic has also
become a child emergency, with
children bearing both its direct
and indirect consequences.
Children may be at lower risk
of severe disease and death from
COVID-19, but they have suffered
many of the most severe social
and economic consequences, and
will bear a large burden of the
long-term fallout.
Many children have missed out
on months of schooling, and have
been exposed to a greater risk
of violence. Girls are especially
at risk in places where they may
never go back to school, as they
approach the age when they will
go to work or be married.
Since the beginning, UNICEF
has been, and will continue to
be, an indispensable partner in
ensuring that children are a primary
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consideration in the global
response to COVID-19.
Together, we have engaged,
empowered and communicated
with communities about the risks
of COVID-19 and how to stay safe;
We have developed joint guidance
for the prevention and control of
COVID-19 in schools;
We’ve supported health workers
with improved infection prevention
and control, and we’ve
supported them to deliver better
care and psycho-social support
for patients, their families and
communities; We’ve procured
and delivered essential supplies;
We’ve provided the joint analytics
that are key to an effective
pandemic response; We’ve
supported countries to maintain
essential health services, including
in humanitarian settings;
And through the Access to
COVID-19 Tools Accelerator and
COVAX, we are poised for the
largest vaccination campaign in
history. Vaccines are the shot in
the arm we all need, literally and
metaphorically.
But we must also remember
that vaccines will complement,
not replace, the proven public
health measures that countries
around the world have used successfully
to prevent and contain
widespread transmission.
As governments, institutions
and individuals, we all have a
role to play in stopping this pandemic
with the tools we have. The
pandemic will subside, but the
inequalities that preceded it will
still be there.
There’s no vaccine for climate
change, poverty or malnutrition.
None of these challenges can be
met by a single agency. Let me
outline three areas in which the
partnership between WHO and
UNICEF, bilaterally and through
the Global Action Plan on Health
and Well-Being for All, must
become even deeper and stronger
as we work together to support
countries to respond, recover and
rebuild.
First, as we support countries
to respond to the pandemic,
we must ensure that all people
and communities enjoy equitable
access to life-saving vaccines,
diagnostics and therapeutics —
rich and poor, urban and rural,
citizen and refugee.
A year ago, we were defenceless
against this virus. Now we
can detect it with rapid diagnostic
tests, we can treat it with dexamethasone
and oxygen, and we
can prevent it with vaccines. The
urgency, ambition and resources
with which vaccines have been
developed must be matched by
the same urgency, ambition and
resources to distribute them fairly.
UNICEF has played a vital role
in procuring vaccines and preparing
countries to deploy them
rapidly once they receive them.
Together, we have supported 124
countries to perform readiness
assessments for vaccination.
But we face significant challenges.
More than 130 million
doses of vaccine have now been
deployed globally, but 75 percent
of them have been in only ten
countries that account for 60 percent
of global GDP.
Meanwhile, almost 130 countries,
with 2.5 billion people, have
yet to administer a single dose.
Many of these countries are also
struggling to secure the resources
for testing, personal protective
equipment, oxygen, and medicines.
I have issued a call to action
to ensure that by World Health
Day on April 7, vaccination of
health workers is underway in all
countries. UNICEF can play a key
role in meeting that challenge.
As a trusted advocate, you can
use your voice and experience in
communities to build acceptance
of vaccines;
You can deploy your unparalleled
logistics and supply capacities
to deliver vaccines to the last
mile; You can negotiate the best
deals for the communities you
serve; And you can mobilize your
networks of National Committees
to resource this historic effort to
save lives and livelihoods.
Second, as we support countries
to recover from the pandemic,
we must support them to
maintain essential health services,
including routine immunization
for children. The pandemic
has shown that we can only meet
the major crises of our time with
a whole-of-government, whole-ofsociety
approach.
In the same way, the challenges
of child development can
only be met with a multi-sectoral
approach that addresses their
access to services, their mental
health and well-being, their nutrition,
their risk factors for developing
NCDs later in life, their educational
outcomes, their chances
on employment, and their need to
be protected from violence.
And third, as we support countries
to rebuild from the pandemic,
we must invest in primary
health care. The pandemic has
given us a brutal reminder of
the importance of primary health
care, as the eyes and ears of every
health system, and the foundation
of universal health coverage.
Ultimately, our fight is not
against a single virus. Our fight
is against the inequalities that
leave children in some countries
exposed to deadly diseases that
are easily prevented in others;
Our fight is against the inequalities
that mean women and their
babies die during childbirth in
some countries because of complications
that are easily prevented
in others;
And our fight is to ensure that
health is no longer a commodity
or a luxury item, but a fundamental
human right, and the foundation
of the safer, fairer and more
sustainable world we all want.
History will not judge us solely
by how we ended the COVID-19
pandemic, but what we learned,
what we changed, and the future
we left our children.
*WHO Director-General in
his opening remarks before the
UNICEF Executive Board
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A health worker at a local health centre in Kinshasa, Democratic
Republic of the Congo, prepares a vaccine injection.
The dispatch of millions of COVID-19 vaccines to Africa
started in February. Credit: UNICEF/Sibylle Desjardins
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