Pandemic is a test and world is failing:says WHO chief

When will Coronavirus pandemic end? "The pandemic is a test and the world is failing." This was the answer WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus gave when some asked him in the International Olympic Committee in Tokyo on Wednesday.  "It's a question I am often asked, and which the people of the world are asking: when will this pandemic end? Indeed, the Covid-19 pandemic has asked us many questions: About ourselves; and about our world," Ghebreyesus said. 

He further said that anyone who thinks the pandemic is over because it's over in the area they live in, they are living in a fool's paradise. Highlighting the gravity of the Covid-19 situation across the world, Tedros said, "More than 4 million people have died and more continue to die. Already this year, the number of deaths is more than double the last year's total." "In the time it takes me to make these remarks, more than 100 people will lose their lives to Covid-19. And by the time the Olympic flame is extinguished on August 8, more than 100,000 more people will perish," Ghebreyesus said.

Elaborating about sufferings, he said, millions of survivors continue to suffer from long-term health consequences of Covid-19, which we are still learning about. The people of the world are sick and tired...And yet, 19 months into the pandemic, and seven months since the first vaccines were approved, we are now in the early stages of another wave of infections and deaths. This is tragic.  "Weren't vaccines meant to douse the flames of the pandemic? Yes, and in countries with the most vaccines, they [vaccines] are helping to do that. But here's the thing about an inferno: if you lose only one part of it, the rest will keep on burning. And the embers of one fire can easily spark another, even more ferocious blaze somewhere else," he said.

According to WHO chief the threat of pandemic will continue to loom untill it's over everywhere and vaccines were available to a "lucky few". Vaccines are powerful and essential tools. But the world has not used them well," Tedros said. Tredos noted that more than 3.5 billion vaccine doses had been administered globally, and more than one in four people received at least one vaccine dose. But it masks a horrifying injustice because 5 per cent of vaccines have been administered in just 10 countries. In low-income countries, only 1 per cent of people have received at least one dose.