Ana içeriğe atla

Humanity needs leadership and solidarity to defeat the coronavirus

Humanity needs leadership and solidarity to defeat the coronavirus
The coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic is the defining global health crisis of our time and the greatest challenge we have faced since World War Two. Since its emergence in Asia late last year, the virus has spread to every continent except Antarctica. Cases are rising daily in Africa the Americas, and Europe.
Countries are racing to slow the spread of the virus by testing and treating patients, carrying out contact tracing, limiting travel, quarantining citizens, and cancelling large gatherings such as sporting events, concerts, and schools.
The pandemic is moving like a wave—one that may yet crash on those least able to cope.
But COVID-19 is much more than a health crisis. By stressing every one of the countries it touches, it has the potential to create devastating social, economic and political crises that will leave deep scars.
We are in uncharted territory. Many of our communities are now unrecognizable. Dozens of the world’s greatest cities are deserted as people stay indoors, either by choice or by government order. Across the world, shops, theatres, restaurants and bars are closing.
Every day, people are losing jobs and income, with no way of knowing when normality will return. Small island nations, heavily dependent on tourism, have empty hotels and deserted beaches. The International Labour Organization estimates that 25 million jobs could be lost.

UNDP response

Every country needs to act immediately to prepare, respond, and recover. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has launched a US$2 billion global humanitarian response plan in the most vulnerable. Developing countries could lose at least US$220 billion in income, and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development has called for US$2.5 trillion to support them.
Drawing on our experience with other outbreaks such as Ebola, HIV, SARS, TB and malaria, as well as our long history of working with the private and public sector, UNDP will help countries to urgently and effectively respond to COVID-19 as part of its mission to eradicate poverty, reduce inequalities and build resilience to crises and shocks.
 "We are already hard at work, together with our UN family and other partners, on three immediate priorities: supporting the health response including the procurement and supply of essential health products, under WHO’s leadership, strengthening crisis management and response, and addressing critical social and economic impacts.”
We have been supporting countries since the very early stages of this crisis, donating more than two million surgical masks and providing life supporting medical equipment such as X-ray machines, infrared thermometers, infusion pumps, protective suits, gloves and hand sanitizer. We are supporting health systems in countries including Bosnia and Herzegovina, Djibouti, El Salvador, Eritrea, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Madagascar, Nigeria, Paraguay, Panama and Ukraine.
In China we launched a social media campaign to spread information about COVID-19 amongst vulnerable communities such as the elderly and other disadvantaged people in 40 different minority languages.

Slide
Handover ceremony at UN compound in Beijing for donation of critical medical supplies to the Chinese government. Photo: UNDP China


In Lebanon we’re supporting the government as it develops a Disaster Risk Management Plan. And in Viet Nam we’re working with the government to communicate with ethnic minorities and those with disabilities, with a focus on the rural areas on China’s border.
Working with WhatsApp, WHO and UNICEF we have created an information hub that will get real time healthcare to billions around the world.

 We have teamed up with AMV, one of the world’s largest advertising agencies, and actor, writer and comedian Stephen Fry for the Tweet Zero campaign, which highlights the simple actions that can keep you safe; such as frequent hand washing, staying home when sick and not touching your face.
Partnering with the European Union in Serbia we have begun delivering and distributing vital medical supplies such respirators, protective equipment and diagnostic tests.
In the Arab states we are working with governments and citizens to deliver essential services, and fight misinformation.
It will require all of society to limit the spread of COVID-19 and to cushion the potentially devastating impact it may have on vulnerable people and economies.
We must rebuild trust and cooperation, within and among nations, and between people and their governments.
UNDP’s support will also help ensure that the responses of individual countries are comprehensive as well as equitable and inclusive, so that no one is left out and countries can continue to make progress in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. 

While we do this, we must also consider ways to prevent a similar pandemic recurring. In the longer term, UNDP will look at ways to help countries to better prevent and manage such crises and ensure that the world makes full use of what we will learn from this one.
A global response now is an investment in our future.

Yorumlar

Yorum Gönder

Bu blogdaki popüler yayınlar

Why COVID-19 makes a compelling case for the wider integration of blockchain

Why COVID-19 Makes A Compelling Case For The Wider İntegration Of Blockchain The COVID-19 crisis has revealed a general lack of connectivity and data exchange built into our global supply chains. Future resiliency will depend on building transparent, inter-operable and connective networks. When it became clear that many of us would soon be working from home, a majority took a cursory glance at their home office set-ups and decided it needed upgrading. What ensued was an unanticipated rush and surge of online orders for office desks, chairs, lamps and computer hardware. But such was the sudden spike that it has unsurprisingly caught suppliers large and small unprepared, off guard and exposed gaping holes in their ability to track purchases from one end of their supply chains to the other. Some customers, who have spent no small amount on revamping their home offices are still waiting to do so, without the consolation of being able to see where their orders are, or when they...
Yorum Gönder
Devamı

Covering the coronavirus pandemic: CNN correspondents reflect on how we got here

Covering the coronavirus pandemic: CNN correspondents reflect on how we got here Atlanta (CNN) As the entire world grapples with the effects of the coronavirus outbreak, it is easy to lose sight of how we got here. There are not many news events in recent memory that have come close to the far-reaching implications in terms of our public health, social interactions, and the global economy; life as we know it has been altered. From the beginning, CNN journalists have covered this unprecedented story from all corners of the globe. Three months since we heard the first whispers of a strange respiratory illness emerging in China, this is the story of a story  from those who have witnessed and reported on it firsthand. Wuhan: Ground Zero On the final day of 2019, the World Health Organization receives word of a pneumonia-like disease in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. According to Wuhan Municipal Health, the cases occur between December 12 and December 29. The...
Yorum Gönder
Devamı

Coronavirus at meatpacking plants worse than first thought, USA TODAY investigation finds

Coronavirus at meatpacking plants worse than first thought, USA TODAY investigation finds Coronavirus closed Smithfield and JBS meatpacking plants. Many more are at risk. Operators may have to choose between worker health or meat in stores. Tyson Foods installed plastic barriers between worker stations at its meat and poultry plants to protect against transmission of the coronavirus. Arash of coronavirus outbreaks at dozens of meatpacking plants across the nation is far more extensive than previously thought, according to an exclusive review of cases by USA TODAY and the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting.  And it could get worse. More than 150 of America’s largest meat processing plants operate in counties where the rate of coronavirus infection is already among the nation’s highest, based on the media outlets’ analysis of slaughterhouse locations and county-level COVID-19 infection rates. These facilities represent more than 1 in 3 of the nation’s...
Yorum Gönder
Devamı