The World Health Organization (WHO) emergency committee is set to meet again next month to discuss whether or not Covid-19 is still a public health emergency of international concern.
WHO Western Pacific Region Emergency Director Dr. Babatunde Olowokure said that the emergency panel will then give their assessment to WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
“There will be a meeting of the emergency committee sometime, I believe, in May and the emergency committee will then consider all the evidence that there are currently is and then will advise the director general of the WHO–will the public health emergency of international concern should continue or not,” said Olowokure in a press briefing on Friday, April 14.
To recall, the WHO declared that Covid-19 (known then as novel coronavirus) constitutes a public health emergency of international concern last January 2020.
In January this year, the WHO ruled that the Covid-19 is still a global health concern following the meeting of the WHO emergency committee. The WHO stated then that Covid-19 is “probably at a transition point” that needs careful management to “mitigate the potential negative consequences.”
“Three years on, I think the Director-General said that now— we are in a much better place than we were three years ago. So we have fewer deaths from Covid-19 so that is a downward trajectory in terms of severity, we are now much more able to treat this particular disease,” said Olowokure.
“The DG has said that he is highly confident that at sometime this year we would be able to declare this public health emergency of international concern over,” he added.
Olowokure reminded countries to not let their guards down despite improvements in the Covid-19 situation.
“We should also remember that the virus itself, while it is still present somewhere in the world, can still cause an outbreak or lead to an epidemic so therefore we need to maintain our vigilance, we need to maintain and strengthen our information systems, and we need to be prepared to respond should there be an outbreak,” he said.