Tag: Health News

The World Health Organization (WHO) recently participated in a number of joint activities at the 146th Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) Assembly which took place from 11-15 March 2023 in Manama, Bahrein. This collaborative work included the launch of the IPU-WHO Handbook on Universal Health Coverage (UHC), which follows up on the 2019 IPU resolution on UHC. The handbook aims to introduce… Read More

On the occasion on World TB Day, the World Health Organization (WHO) is announcing the expanded scope of the WHO Director-General’s (DG) Flagship Initiative on tuberculosis over the period from 2023 to 2027 to support fast-tracking progress towards ending TB and achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC) by 2030. Tuberculosis remains one of the world’s top infectious killers, causing 1.6 million… Read More

The world is facing an upsurge in cholera, even touching countries that have not had the disease in decades. Years of progress against this age-old disease have disappeared. While the situation is unprecedented, the lesson to draw is not a new one: safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene are the only long-term and sustainable solutions to ending this cholera emergency… Read More

The private sector has a major influence on health through its products and practices. Commercial actors influence health in varied and complex ways. They have been fundamental in developing and delivering essential health goods and services, but some of their products and practices are responsible for escalating ill-health and health inequity worldwide. The frameworks for understanding and an agenda for… Read More

On 12 March 2023, WHO was made aware of new SARS-CoV-2 sequences and metagenomics data associated with samples collected in the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, Wuhan, China, from January 2020, that became available on GISAID for a short period of time. The data had subsequently been downloaded by a number of researchers from several countries. Access was restricted shortly after,… Read More

As the historic United Nations Water Conference commences today – the first in nearly 50 years – the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) call on all nations to radically accelerate action to make water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) a reality for all. The numbers are staggering – around the world, 2 billion people lack… Read More

Partnership for Healthy Cities award recipients include Montevideo, Uruguay for food policy; Mexico City, Mexico for road safety; Vancouver, Canada for surveillance; Athens, Greece for overdose prevention, and Bengaluru, India for tobacco control. The first-of-its-kind Summit was convened in London by Bloomberg Philanthropies, World Health Organization, Vital Strategies, and Mayor Sadiq Khan of London. Today, during the inaugural Partnership for… Read More

WHO has updated its tracking system and working definitions for variants of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, to better correspond to the current global variant landscape, to independently evaluate Omicron sublineages in circulation, and classify new variants more clearly when required. SARS-CoV-2 continues to evolve. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, multiple variants of concern (VOCs) and variants… Read More

The World Health Organization (WHO) and the European Society for Clinical and Economic Aspects of Osteoporosis, Osteoarthritis and Musculoskeletal Diseases (ESCEO) today signed an agreement to develop a strategic roadmap on bone health and ageing and advocate for a public health strategy to prevent fractures among older people. The five-year agreement was signed at the WHO Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland… Read More

The World Health Organization (WHO) released today an updated WHO health workforce support and safeguards list 2023, identifying 55 countries as vulnerable for availability of health workers required to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal target for universal health coverage (UHC) by 2030. The impact of COVID-19 and widespread disruptions to health services has resulted in a rapid acceleration in… Read More