Hopes over COVID-19 vaccines have given a boost to virus-weary citizens across the globe, but the disease remains rampant and world leaders are urging people to be patient.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, speaking from quarantine after coming in contact with someone who tested positive for COVID-19, warned that the virus preys on weakness.
The novel coronavirus has killed at least 1,105,691 people since the outbreak emerged in China last December, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 1100 GMT on Saturday.
France reported nearly 17,000 new coronavirus cases on Saturday alone, the highest daily number since the country began widespread testing.
At a joint ministerial briefing in Pretoria on Wednesday on the new transport regulations under lockdown level 1, the minister said the data of the countries allowed in the country would be reviewed every two weeks.
The WHO said the $600 million scheme would enable low- and middle-income countries to close the dramatic gap in testing for the new coronavirus.
The country with the most coronavirus deaths is the United States with over 190,000 fatalities, followed by Brazil.
The past 30 years have seen remarkable strides forward in preventing or treating causes of infant deaths including premature births and pneumonia.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the facility was critical to ending the COVID-19 pandemic, and would not only pool risk for countries developing and buying vaccines, but also ensure prices are kept 'as low as possible'.
The move shows the two countries’ keen interest in an overhaul aimed at strengthening the WHO, despite talks on the matter with the United States collapsing earlier in August at G7 level over differing views about the reform.
Countries putting their own interests ahead of others in trying to ensure supplies of a possible vaccine are making the pandemic worse, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva on Tuesday.
Africa last week surpassed the figure of one million infections, with the continent's most developed economy, South Africa, accounting for more than half of those cases.
Russia's vaccine, developed by the Gamaleya research institute and the defence ministry, is among the 28 in clinical evaluation but is listed by the WHO as only being in Phase 1.
With much of the world caught in a cycle of dispiriting outbreaks and economically crushing lockdowns, all eyes are on the race for a vaccine.
Russia's Sputnik V vaccine has been developed by the Gamaleya research institute in coordination with the country's defence ministry.
Economic recovery around the world could come faster if any COVID-19 vaccine is made available to all as a public good, World Health Organisation Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Thursday.
WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan said it could be 'disastrous' in such circumstances to allow the return of sports matches with tens of thousands of people attending.
Russia said Monday it aims to launch mass production of a coronavirus vaccine in September and turn out 'several million' doses per month by next year.
