'Blood on your hands' if world steps back on tackling COVID-19 now: WHO official

Aylward co-ordinates the ACT-Accelerator, a partnership between WHO and other global health bodies to help poorer countries access COVID-19 tools.

The effort, which includes the vaccine-focused COVAX, has reached billions of people worldwide but has faced criticism for not acting quickly enough. There had been some speculation that the effort may wind up this autumn, but Aylward said it was simply changing its focus as the pandemic changes. Over the next six months, the partnership will aim particularly at delivering vaccines to the roughly one quarter of the world's health care workers and elderly who have still not had a shot, as well as on improving access to test-and-treat, particularly with Pfizer's Paxlovid, he said.

It will also look to the future as COVID-19 is"here to stay", and unless systems are put in place, support will collapse once other industrialised nations also think the pandemic is over, said Aylward. The initiative already has an US$11 billion gap in its budget, with most of its available US$5.7 billion in funding pledged towards vaccines rather than tests or treatments.

Meanwhile in Africa, where theres very low vaccination rate and no masking, yet Covid is essentially over. 💁‍♂️

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