WHO scrambles to improve global response

GENEVA, April 8, (KUNA): The World Health Organization said it was striving to improve the supply networks, and sending equipment and testing kits to its member states to help them respond to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19).

Significant efforts are underway to improve access to items essential for the COVID-19 emergency response, the organization affirmed in a press release on Tuesday. Through the continued efforts of WHO and the Pandemic Supply Chain Network (PSCN), the personal protective equipment (PPE) manufacturing market is beginning to open, however demand continues to outstrip available supply.

The Operations Support and Logistics (OSL) unit at WHO is working to convene meetings with key stakeholders including oxygen, ventilator and concentrator manufacturers and producers of associated ancillary equipment.

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In addition to securing the appropriate equipment for those countries at most risk or most vulnerable, WHO and the PSCN is working with the World Bank and other UN agencies to ensure that the infrastructure, technical guidance and other operational guidance is available.

Through collaboration with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), OSL’s COVID-19 Essential Supplies Forecasting Tool has been finalized, according to the statement.

Output from the model is being shared with partners and is assisting both procurement agencies and suppliers in understanding national requirements of key supplies. Since the beginning of the outbreak, OSL has shipped more than 900,000 surgical masks, 62,000 N95 masks, one million gloves, 115,000 gowns, 17,000 goggles and 34,000 face shields to 133 countries.

The OSL has also shipped COVID-19 testing kits to 126 countries, the statement pointed out. The OSL has also launched and supported the COVID-19 Health Logistics Project, establishing direct technical support to hospitals to re-design their facilities into infectious disease treatment units.

This support has included improving patient and healthcare worker flow, promoting rational use of PPE, and minimizing nosocomial transmission.

To achieve these aims, OSL has established the Health Logistics Technical Network (HLTN). The network is composed of recognized universities, humanitarian institutions and international NGOs focused on technical interventions.

A WHO-based helpdesk serves as a centralized resource to answer technical questions, verify and provide inputs on COVID-19 facility layouts, troubleshoot problems, and facilitate solutions to problems while supporting experts in the field.

Helpdesk support has been successfully provided in Australia for the Canberra Hospital Campus SARI layout, and additional support has been requested from Italy and France, it added.

Meanwhile, UNESCO on Tuesday called on all societies to protect the vulnerable from the novel coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic which is set to take a huge toll on aged, sick and needy people.

UNESCO’s experts said in a statement that there should be “collective responsibility” to protect the most vulnerable in our societies at all times and even more so during the Covid-19 pandemic.

“The pandemic may generate aggravated psychological stress among vulnerable and marginalized people and groups in all parts of the world and even more so in developing countries,” the statement said, noting that these countries have very limited resources to combat the virus.

In this March 25, 2020 file photo, medical staff tend to patients at the intensive care unit of the Casalpalocco COVID-19 Clinic on the outskirts of Rome. The pressures on intensive care units in Italy and Spain may have eased in recent days as new coronavirus cases decline, but the psychological toll the pandemic has taken on the doctors and nurses who work there is only now beginning to emerge. (AP)