WHO and Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) co-chaired on the 6th of October the third emergency Health Cluster Meeting on Novel coronavirus, COVID-19. The meeting aimed to update the Health Cluster partners about the current situation on COVID-19, the status of COVID-19 vaccine development, and Essential Health Services during COVID-19.
The event was attended by 68 representatives from public institutions, UN agencies and development partners, national and international NGOs.
During the event Professor Dr. Meerjady Sabrina Flora, Additional Director General, (Planning and Development), Directorate General of Health Services, appreciated the support of UN and development partners for the country response to COVID-19 and further appealed for joining efforts, outlining that health cluster is a platform where effective decisions can be taken by all members for an effective coordinated response.
Dr. Bhupinder Kaur Aulakh, Deputy Representative of WHO Country Office, provided a brief background of the overall response emphasizing the global dimensions of the pandemic and the initial lack of the country’s adequate preparation to manage COVID-19 pandemic in terms of human resources, logistics, lab, and hospital supports. Though gradually the country has developed a considerable capacity to manage the situation, there is still need for improving the response to limit the spread and ensure adequate clinical management.
In continuation, Dr. A S M Alamgir, IEDCR, offered a broader perspective of the current situation of COVID-19 in Bangladesh, including gender and age segregation of morbidity and mortality, characteristics of different types coronavirus as well as severity of the virus.
During the event, WHO presented Access to global COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator, a global collaboration to expedite the development, production, and equitable access to COVID-19 diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines. Within this initiative, a special emphasis was put on the Vaccine Pillar (COVAX) of the ACT accelerator that aims to urge the development and manufacture of COVID-19 vaccines. COVAX also aims to guarantee fair and equitable access for every country in the world for priority target groups such as health workers, frontline providers, vulnerable populations.
Within the meeting, it also pointed out that in Bangladesh, as well as in most the countries in the world, essential health services have been disrupted between March to May 2020 and since then are gradually recovering. WHO experts presented the status of several essential services such as emergency health services, outpatient and inpatient health services, maternal health that faced sharp declines during the above-mentioned period, are continuously picking up the decreased usage rates at all tiers of health systems.
WHO continues to work with the Government of Bangladesh and health partners to limit the spread and contain COVID-19 threat, and to fully resume the accessibility and demand of essential health services that have been disturbed due to the pandemic.