UNIS/SGSM/1467
20 December 2024
COVID-19 was a wake-up call to the world. Millions of lives lost, economies shattered, health systems pushed to the brink and daily life upended for all of humanity.
The crisis may have passed, but a harsh lesson remains: the world is woefully unprepared for the next pandemic. Outbreaks of mpox, cholera, polio and Marburg are startling reminders that infectious diseases remain a real and present danger to every country.
On this International Day of Epidemic Preparedness, I call on countries to heed the lessons of past health emergencies to help prepare for the next.
This means building resilient public and primary health care systems and making good on the promise of Universal Health Coverage. It means making bold investments in pandemic monitoring, detection and response. And it means ensuring equitable access to life-saving tools like vaccines, treatments and diagnostics.
Most of all, it means global solidarity. I call on countries to deliver on the historic Pandemic Agreement to ensure the world works better, together, to prevent and contain future pandemics.
Today, and every day, let’s commit to working together for a safer and healthier world for everyone, everywhere.
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With the deposit of the instrument of accession at the UN Headquarters in New York, Bahrain becomes the sixteenth State Party to the United Nations Convention on International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation, also known as the "Singapore Convention on Mediation".
Visa-free entry, temporary protection and targeted anti-trafficking measures across Europe for refugees from Ukraine are effectively mitigating trafficking and smuggling risks, suggests a new study from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), launched today in Kyiv.
The new Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the United Nations (Vienna), Yurii Vitrenko, presented his credentials today to the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Vienna (UNOV), Ghada Waly.
During its 142nd session, the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) focused on ensuring the functioning of the international drug control system and efforts to ensure the availability of controlled medicines and to prevent illicit drug manufacture, diversion and misuse.
