WHO’S PANDEMIC

RESPONSE – A
CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Dakshita Dubey
2117
WORLD HEALTH
ORGANISATION
 The World Health Organization (WHO) was founded on 7th April 1948, in the immediate
aftermath of the Second World War, with the idealism and ambition that marked the creation
of the United Nations system as a whole.
 The idealism was apparent in its objective – ‘the attainment by all peoples of the highest
possible level of health’ – and the ambition in the 22 wide-ranging functions defined in its
constitution, of which the first was ‘to act as the directing and co-ordinating authority on
international health work’.
 The head of the organization is the director-general, elected by the World Health Assembly.
The term lasts for five years, and Directors-General are typically appointed in May, when the
Assembly meets. The current director-general is Dr. Tedhros Adhanom who was appointed on
1 July 2017.
WORLD HEALTH
ORGANISATION – HEAD
OFFICES
WHO - FUNCTIONS
WHO - STRUCTURE
 WHO’S ROLE DURING
PANDEMIC - DECLARATION
 It is believed that “patient zero” in the coronavirus outbreak was a resident of Wuhan – a large city in Hubei
province in China – who began experiencing symptoms on December 1, 2019, and was hospitalized around
December 16. It was not until December 27, however, that abnormalities in other hospital patients’ CT scans
were reported to local authorities.
 On January 30, 2020, WHO’s Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, declared the coronavirus
outbreak a global public health emergency
 In just a short time, a localised outbreak of COVID-19 evolved into a global pandemic with three defining
characteristics:
• Speed and scale: the disease has spread quickly to all corners of the world, and its capacity for explosive spread
has overwhelmed even the most resilient health systems.
• Severity: overall 20% of cases are severe or critical, with a crude clinical case fatality rate currently of over 3%,
increasing in older age groups and in those with certain underlying conditions.
• Societal and economic disruption: shocks to health and social care systems and measures taken to control
transmission have had broad and deep socio-economic consequences.
WHO’S ROLE DURING
PANDEMIC - MONITORING
WHO’S ROLE DURING
PANDEMIC - VACCINATION
 Vaccine uptake or vaccination rate: the number of people vaccinated with a certain dose of the vaccine in a
certain time period (e.g. during a month or year), which can be expressed as an absolute number or as the
proportion of a target population. Vaccination coverage: the vaccinated proportion of a target population.
Coverage can be estimated by accounting for vaccination in previous time periods (weeks, months, years).
CRITICAL ANALYSIS
 IHR VIOLATION BY CHINA – NOT HELD ACCOUNTABLE
 PHEIC – DECLARED LATE
 TRAVEL BAN WAS DELAYED
 UNEQUAL IMPACT OF THE VIRUS
THANK YOU!