WHO asks for more economic contributions to face Covid-19

The World Health Organization (WHO) called on the most developed nations to contribute some 23,000 million dollars to be able to deal with the coronavirus and end the health emergency in 2022.

In this context, a group of international governments agreed on a new financing framework in support of the ACT Accelerator plan, an international collaboration mechanism of the WHO, aimed especially at raising funds from the richest nations.

The first objective, as recognized by the body itself, is to “cover the budget deficit” of some 16,000 million dollars from the ACT Accelerator. The corresponding nations will contribute a certain amount based on the capacities of their own economies and the benefits that a more rapid recovery of the world economy and trade would bring them.

This amount is expected to finance the work of the different ACT Accelerator agencies, whose research would allow the acquisition of tools that the WHO considers “essential” to combat the coronavirus and provide them to those countries with lower incomes.

According to the United Nations health agency, of the more than 4.7 billion coronavirus tests that have been carried out throughout the planet, only about 22 million, around 0.4 %, have been carried out in low-income nations. Countries where as few as ten percent of the inhabitants have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

Source: dpa