UN Calls for Equal Affordability of COVID-19 Vaccines, Treatment

UN Calls for Equal Affordability of COVID-19 Vaccines, Treatment

Peter Uzoho with agency report

The United Nations has called for a global effort to develop and distribute to all at affordable prices vaccines, treatments and testing kits against the COVID-19 pandemic currently ravaging the world.

The UN Secretary General, Mr. Antonio Guterres, made the call yesterday at the start of a global pledging conference aimed to raise at least $8 billion to fight against the virus.

“These new tools will help us to fully control the pandemic, and must be treated as global public goods available and affordable for all,” Reuters quoted Guterres as saying.

Also, the Head of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, reportedly said at the same event that “the ultimate measure of success will not be how fast we can develop tools. It will be how equally we can distribute them. None of us can accept a world in which some people are protected while others remain exposed.”

Meanwhile, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had authorised emergency use of Ebola drug ‘Remdesivir’ for the treatment of COVID-19 after it scaled through clinical trial in the country.

Also, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) had last Sunday endorsed the use of Remdesivir for the treatment of COVID-19 patients in Nigeria, saying the result of the clinical trial in the US had revealed its immense benefits.

Related Articles