World ‘must sign up to pandemic treaty’

THE world remains vulnerable to future pandemics without an internationally co-ordinated effort to prepare for such events, global leaders have warned.

Boris Johnson and his French and German counterparts Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel are among 24 leaders calling for a treaty to ‘systematically tackle the gaps exposed by Covid-19’.

With a deal in place, issues about research and the production and distribution of medicines and vaccines could be addressed, they said.

The letter from national leaders, published in newspapers across the world yesterday, said coronavirus had been the ‘biggest challenge to the global community since the 1940s’.

It added there was a shared commitment to ‘ensuring universal and equitable access to safe, efficacious and affordable vaccines, medicines and diagnostics for this and future pandemics’.

The treaty would be based on the World Health Organization principles of ‘health for all and no discrimination’, the body’s director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

Notable names missing from the list include US president Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping but Dr Tedros said he expected all 194 WHO member states would be involved in the treaty’s negotiation. He told a press briefing

THE BST Hyde Park festival has been cancelled for the second year in a row. Duran Duran were scheduled to play their first London show in six years at the event this summer. Instead they will appear on July 10 next year, with Nile Rodgers and Chic. BST bosses said that, after reviewing pandemic advice, they were ‘unable to deliver with certainty the quality BST is known for in the time available’.

that feedback from the US and China had been positive.

Coronavirus has led to nearly 2.8million deaths worldwide, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University. Yesterday in the UK, a further 56 people had died with another 4,040 infections.