The emergency committee of the World Health Organization will meet in May to evaluate if they’ll carry or proceed to declare COVID-19 as a “public health emergency of international concern”.
At a press briefing Friday, WHO Western Pacific Regional Emergency Director Babatunde Olowokure stated the evaluation of the emergency committee on the worldwide COVID-19 scenario might be endorsed to WHO director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus for applicable determination.
“There will be a meeting of the emergency committee some time in May and the emergency committee will then consider all the evidence that there is and then will advise the director-general of the WHO if the public health emergency of international concern should continue or not,” Olowokure stated.
“The [director-general] has said that he is highly confident that at some time this year, we will be able to declare this public health emergency of international concern over,” he added.
Among the components that the emergency committee will think about are the transmission of the COVID-19, the severity of hospitalizations and deaths, and the brand new variants which may have an effect on the prevailing countermeasures towards the virus.
This comes after some nations have already declared the top of the COVID-19 public well being emergency regionally.
“For them the emergency itself is over, but at this time, the public health emergency of international concern remains in place,” Olowokure stated.
In January this yr, the Department of Health (DOH) stated that the Philippines is prepared ought to the WHO declare an finish to the worldwide well being emergency because of COVID-19 after the WHO expressed hope that COVID-19 would now not be a worldwide well being emergency sooner or later in 2023.
On Wednesday, the DOH stated the nation could declare an finish to the state of public well being emergency if the COVID-19 scenario within the Philippines stays manageable.
Figures from the DOH on Thursday confirmed 385 contemporary infections with 54 instances of Omicron subvariant XBB.1.9.1. The XBB sublineage was not too long ago added to the listing of variants beneath monitoring by the WHO.
Meanwhile, Olowokure stated the WHO will not be anticipating a fast unfold of Omicron subvariant XBB.1.9.1 within the Philippines even after the DOH reported 54 contemporary instances of the pressure.
“The transmissibility, yes, we recognize this maybe a challenge but as we have seen, there has only been a very slight increase in cases. So we are not looking at an outbreak of massive proportions but at the moment we are looking at something which is easily controllable and for which we can provide support that is necessary to DOH,” the WHO official stated. —VAL, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
