Evaluation Panel's Work Will Not Disrupt WHO's COVID-19 Response - Ryan

GENEVA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 10th July, 2020) The executive director of the World Health Organization's Health Emergencies Programme, Michael Ryan, said that he looked forward to learning plenty from the newly set up evaluation panel but believes its work will not interrupt the organizations' pandemic response.

A day prior, WHO announced the evaluation panel which will study the international response to the coronavirus pandemic in accordance with a resolution adopted during the World Health Assembly in May. Former Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark were announced co-chairs of the panel.

"I trust [the panel, WHO leadership and member states] will find the appropriate pace and the appropriate approach that will allow us both to learn the lessons of this response at all levels, but at the same time not to interrupt or disrupt what is a very important pandemic response right now," Ryan told a virtual briefing.

Although the parameters of the panel's work is still being set out, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus proposed it hold monthly briefings on the progress, present an interim report in January and present its findings in May of next year.