Your Excellency Minister Budi,
Excellencies, dear colleagues and friends,
Selamat pagi. Good morning, it’s a pleasure to be here.
My thanks to my friend Minister Budi and Indonesia for your leadership and great hospitality.
It’s fair to say that the world is very different now than it was when we last met in Rome last year.
Reported cases and deaths from COVID-19 have now declined 90% from their peaks in January.
In many of your countries, all restrictions have now been lifted, and life looks much like it did before the pandemic.
Of course, this is progress, but the perception that the pandemic is over is understandable, but misguided.
Transmission is increasing in many countries, including some of yours, and this is despite the fact that testing and sequencing have dropped markedly around the world.
And 40% of the world’s population remains unvaccinated.
The risk of a new and more dangerous variant emerging remains very real.
WHO remains very concerned that the lack of testing and sequencing is blinding us to the evolution of the virus.
We are equally concerned that the lessons of this pandemic will go unlearned, and the cycle of panic and neglect will be repeated.
Already many other crises are dominating the attention of governments and the world’s media.
At the World Health Assembly last month, WHO presented a proposal for a new global architecture for health emergency preparedness and response.
It includes 10 key recommendations for stronger governance, stronger systems and tools, stronger financing and a stronger WHO at the centre of the global health security architecture.
One of those recommendations is for the creation of a Financial Intermediary Fund, housed at the World Bank.
WHO and the World Bank estimate that 31 billion US dollars is needed every year for strengthening global health security. Two-thirds of that could come from existing resources, but that leaves a gap of 10 billion US dollars per year.
A flexible and agile FIF would help to close that gap.
WHO has been working closely with the World Bank on what the FIF would look like, and we have listened closely to G20 countries in this process.
Our proposal is that the FIF would be overseen by a board that makes decisions about funding allocations, supported by a technical advisory panel.
Both the board and the technical advisory panel would be supported by a joint World Bank-WHO Secretariat, based at the Bank’s headquarters in Washington, with staff seconded from WHO.
The Bank would provide financial and administrative leadership in the Secretariat, operating as trustee for the FIF, holding and transferring donor funds, and providing administrative services.
WHO would provide technical leadership, coordinating inputs for the technical advisory panel, and preparing relevant technical documentation, recommendations and reports for the board.
Both the Bank and WHO would act as implementing entities, along with other global health partners with relevant expertise, including the Global Fund, Gavi , FIND, CEPI and others.
And both WHO and the World Bank would be non-voting Members of the FIF’s governing board.
Crucially, the governance of the FIF must be inclusive, with a structure that enables representation of all countries.
And it must also be coherent with other parts of the global architecture for health emergency preparedness and response.
That includes another of WHO’s 10 recommendations to develop a new platform for the rapid development of, and equitable access to, countermeasures during future pandemics.
This platform should be built on the experience of the ACT Accelerator, the Pandemic Influenza Framework and other mechanisms.
This is an important focus of the G20 health track under Minister Budi’s leadership.
Terima kasih.
So my thanks to you, Minister Budi, and to Indonesia, and to all G20 countries for your engagement in this process.
We look forward to your feedback, and to your active participation in building and financing a FIF that is inclusive, equitable and effective in making our world safer from pandemics.
I also thank you for your attention to TB, antimicrobial resistance, local production, and the necessity of a One Health approach.
Because of disruptions to health systems during the COVID-19 pandemic, TB deaths rose last year for the first time in a decade.
Reversing this trend requires increased domestic investment, with international support, to expand access to services for prevention, diagnostics and treatment.
But it also requires investments in research.
We need effective vaccines, affordable rapid point of care diagnostics, and more effective, affordable and nontoxic treatments, particularly for drug-resistant TB.
Later this year, WHO is organizing a high-level summit to accelerate the development of new TB vaccines.
We also appreciate your focus on antimicrobial resistance, and we look forward to discussing this topic with you at the event scheduled for August.
The fight against both TB and AMR are perfect examples of the need for a “One Health” approach.
For years, WHO has worked closely with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health as part of the One Health tripartite.
Earlier this year, we officially became a quadripartite, with the welcome addition of the UN Environment Programme.
We look forward to working with our partners, to support countries to implement our One Health Joint Plan of Action.
One Health is one of the guiding principles of the new international agreement for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response, which WHO’s Member States are now negotiating.
Thank you once again for your commitment to protecting and promoting the health of your own people, and the people of the whole world.
Terima kasih. I thank you.