Do not give in to panic.
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday asked member states for a “rational” and “proportional” response to Omicron, calling for “calm” in the face of the new variant of the coronavirus which has been causing panic for a few days.
“The global response must be calm, coordinated and coherent,” argued Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, during a briefing to Member States on Omicron, at WHO headquarters in Geneva.
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“I fully understand the concern of all countries to protect their citizens against a variant that we do not yet fully understand. But I am equally concerned that several member states are introducing general and brutal measures which are neither evidence-based nor effective in themselves, and which will only worsen inequalities, ”he said.
"We call on all member states to take rational measures proportionate to the risk, in accordance with the International Health Regulations", the benchmark legal instrument for WHO and its signatory countries, he said.
The WHO chief stressed that the organization "takes this development very seriously" and called on member states to do the same.
But he stressed that we should “not be surprised” by this development: “This is what viruses do”.
The problem of vaccine access
"The longer we allow the pandemic to drag on - by not addressing inequalities in access to vaccines or by not implementing social and public health measures in an appropriate and consistent manner - the more we give this virus the possibility of mutating in a way that we can neither anticipate nor prevent, ”argued Dr Tedros.
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Faced with the Omicron variant, the world is barricaded
Originally reported in southern Africa last week, this new strain has been detected on all continents.
This has prompted many states to suspend travel to southern Africa, institute preventive measures and, for those better off in vaccine stocks, to urge their populations to be injected a 3rd dose.
Mr Tedros thanked “Botswana and South Africa for detecting, sequencing and reporting this variant so quickly”, and said he was “deeply concerned that these countries are now being penalized by others for to have done the right thing ”.
