Director-General's opening remarks at the Strategic Roundtable on Health Emergency Preparedness and Response – 26 May 2022 - ISS-G20 Laboratorium Repository

Excellencies, dear colleagues and friends,

Winston Churchill famously said, “Never let a good crisis go to waste.”

We have lost so much and learned so much in the pandemic.

That loss must not be in vain, and those lessons must be learned.

We have a window of opportunity now to make fundamental changes to prevent and prepare for future health emergencies, and to mitigate their impact.  

Yesterday, Member States noted the Secretariat’s report outlining a proposal for a more equitable, inclusive and coherent global architecture for health emergency preparedness and response.

We prepared this proposal in response to a request at the Executive Board, and in consultation with Member States, synthesizing more than 300 recommendations from the various reviews of the response to the pandemic.

It makes recommendations for enhanced governance that is coherent, inclusive and accountable;

Stronger systems and tools to prevent, detect and respond rapidly to health emergencies;

And adequate and efficient financing, domestically and internationally.

Already, many of the parts of this architecture are being built.

A new legal instrument is being negotiated;

We are working jointly with the World Bank on the design of a financial intermediary fund, with financial leadership by the Bank and technical leadership by WHO.

And many new systems and tools are taking shape: the WHO Hub for Pandemic and Epidemic Intelligence; the WHO BioHub System; the Universal Health and Preparedness Review; the WHO Academy, and others. 

Of course, we are not starting from scratch. We have existing structures to build on, including the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, or GOARN, the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Framework, the ACT Accelerator, the R&D Blueprint, and others.

And of course, the International Health Regulations remain central to the global health architecture.

The task before us is to bring these existing pieces together with the new initiatives into a cohesive, inclusive and equitable whole.

We thank all Member States who expressed strong support for the proposal outlined in the report, and we look forward to your feedback on this proposed architecture, and to building it with you.

Crucially, these solutions cannot be designed, built or managed by those with the most power, money and influence.

They must be designed, built and managed by all Member States and partners, in a truly inclusive process.

This is one of my five key priorities for the next five years. And it is closely connected to the other priorities:

After all, investments in health promotion and primary health care are investments in health security, and vice versa.

Thank you all once again for your strong engagement in this process, and I look forward to hearing your feedback and ideas today and in the months to come.

I thank you. 

Entire content available on: https://www.who.int/director-general/speeches/detail/director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-strategic-roundtable-on-health-emergency-preparedness-and-response---26-may-2022