“Global Health”: the virus accelerates in the Arab countries which have controlled it

Yesterday, the World Health Organization announced that the number of “Covid-19” epidemic cases in the eastern Mediterranean region has exceeded two million, warning that some countries that have succeeded in controlling the epidemic record an acceleration in the spread of infection. .

Ahmed Al-Mandhari, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean, said in a statement: “Our region has taken another important milestone this week, with the number of cases (Covid-19) exceeding two million”, as quoted by the French press Agency.

The organization called on the 22 countries of the region to “continue to implement known and proven prevention measures”. Especially with the start of the school year and the approach of winter and influenza season. Al-Mandhari said that “there are many countries which succeeded in controlling the transmission of the disease a few months ago, notably Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan and Lebanon. But it is now witnessing an acceleration in the number of emerging cases. He added that “other countries are experiencing increasing trends, such as Libya, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.”

So far, the new Corona virus has killed around 900,000 people worldwide since it emerged in China in December, according to WHO statistics.

In this context, the Ministry of Health in Tunisia yesterday counted a record number of 465 new cases of the new Corona virus in 24 hours, which is an unprecedented number in the country since last March.

Tunisia has seen a rapid rise in the virus for weeks, bringing a total of 4,681 infections and 49 deaths since June 27, when the borders reopened to international flights, after a period of closure that lasted more than three months.

For its part, the UAE government has announced the registration of 930 new infections with the emerging “Corona” virus, which is the highest daily number recorded for four months. On the other hand, Jordan confirmed yesterday that it had registered its first three cases of coronavirus, in the largest camp for Syrian refugees, days after the discovery of two cases in a smaller refugee camp, according to Reuters.

Al-Mamlaka TV quoted Mafraq governor Yasser Al-Adwan as saying that the cases in Zaatari camp include Jordanians working there and a Syrian refugee. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said in a statement that the injured refugee had been sent to an isolation area and contact tracing was underway. The camp is home to around 77,000 Syrian refugees.

UNHCR also confirmed on Tuesday that the Jordanian authorities registered the first two cases of coronavirus in the Azraq camp for Syrian refugees since the outbreak of the pandemic in the Kingdom.

There are a number of Syrians infected with the disease outside the camps, out of around 2,739 cases so far in Jordan, since the first case was recorded on March 2. Most of the 665,000 Syrian refugees registered with the United Nations in Jordan live in urban areas, Reuters reports.

On a related note, the chief scientist of the World Health Organization said yesterday that the decision of the company “AstraZeneca” to stop testing its vaccine against the virus “Corona” after a of the participants fell ill was “a wake-up call”; But this should not discourage researchers.

Somaya Swaminathan said at a hypothetical press briefing from Geneva: “It’s a wake-up call to realize that there are fluctuations in clinical development, and we have to be prepared.” “This should not discourage us,” she added. These things happen. “

For his part, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for raising an additional $ 35 billion, including $ 15 billion over the next three months, to fund a World Health Organization program that supports the availability of vaccines to prevent “Covid-19” around the world.

Total contributions to this program have so far reached $ 3 billion, which Guterres described in an online meeting yesterday as “low seed funding” for what the World Health Organization is targeting. and represents less than 10% of what it needs for the program called “ACT” in reference to For the initials of the rapid provision of tools to prevent “Covid-19”.

“We now need an additional $ 35 billion to take the program from the starting point to broadening the scope and impact … There is an urgent and real need for these sums,” said Guterres at a council meeting formed to promote the program. Without pumping 15 billion in the next three months, from now on, we will lose the current opportunity.