Over 190,000 dead worldwide, nearly two-thirds of them in Europe. Over 2.7 million cases diagnosed. And a question: in the face of the crisis, will countries manage to come together around a common strategy and common means?
This Friday, countries like France, Germany, Italy or Spain, but also private economic players such as the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation were virtually at the side of the World Health Organization during a press conference to mobilize in favor of an acceleration of the production of vaccines, treatments and diagnostic tests against Covid-19.
“It is a historic collaboration to accelerate the development, production and equitable distribution of vaccines, diagnostics and treatments against Covid-19“, said the boss of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
But neither the China, where the first cases of the new coronavirus were announced in late December, nor United States, the current epicenter of the pandemic with nearly 900,000 cases, of which more than 50,000 have so far been fatal, were not represented.
On the financial plan, the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen will oversee a donor conference on May 4 to raise 7.5 billion euros.
In all, more than 70 pre-clinical trials for a vaccine are underway worldwide according to a WHO document dated April 23, 2020, while at least 6 have already entered the testing phase on humans.
Universal access
But the key would also be to ensure that all these advances can be accessible to all countries, and not only to the most developed.
“We not only need a vaccine and treatments for a country, a region or half the world, but a vaccine and treatments that are not too expensive, safe, effective, easy to administer and available to everyone everywhere.“, hammered António Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations.
To put it simply: a gigantic challenge, which will require collaboration between countries which are not always in excellent terms on the diplomatic level.
“I hope that we will manage to reconcile, if I may say, with this joint initiative China and the United States of America because it is basically to say the fight against Covid-19 is a common good of humanity and no division, basically, takes place to win this battle“, said French President Emmanuel Macron.
A cooperation that will also be useful to face the other big challenge: economic, this time. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) have called on countries to reduce export restrictions, described “as dangerously counterproductive” in this context of global crisis.
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