Global public health demands the efforts from all

The World Trade Organization’s incoming chief Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala recently warned against “vaccine nationalism’ that would slow progress in ending the COVID-19 pandemic and could erode economic growth for all countries, rich and poor.

“No one is safe until everyone is safe. Vaccine nationalism at this time just will not pay, because the variants are coming. If other countries are not immunized, it will just be a blow back,” she said during an interview with Reuters published on Feb. 16, 2021. “It’s unconscionable that people will be dying elsewhere, waiting in a queue, when we have the technology.”

It is not long since the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the same warning to the world that “we now face the real danger that even as vaccines bring hope to some, they become another brick in the wall of inequality between the world’s haves and have-nots.”

The world should renew the spirit of cooperation on global public health by working together to improve public health situations, making it easier and more efficient for institutions such as the WHO to address the world’s health challenges.

Covid-19’s continuing ravages present all countries with an opportunity to restore and rebuild the relationships, beginning by examining the very notion of global health and end the politicization of the WHO.

China's Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian stressed again during a regular press conference that China's position on issues related to COVID-19 is consistent and clear. “The novel coronavirus is the common enemy of all mankind. It respects no races or nationalities,” he said. “China firmly opposes the wrong acts of pinning labels on the virus and politicizing the pandemic.”

Find the original article at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trade-wto-nigeria-idUSKBN2AF1QM