The World Health Organization (WHO) requires some $1.7 billion to fund the coronavirus response in 2020, but $800 million has already been received from donors, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd May, 2020) The World Health Organization (WHO) requires some $1.7 billion to fund the coronavirus response in 2020, but $800 million has already been received from donors, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday.
"We updated the plan earlier this month, with an estimate that WHO will require 1.7 billion U.S. Dollars to fund our response to COVID-19 this year. So far, almost 800 million U.S. dollars has been pledged or received, leaving a gap of just over 900 million dollars," Tedros said in a press release.
The WHO chief also mentioned that the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund, launched together with the United Nations Foundation and the Swiss Philanthropy Foundation, has so far raised over $214 million from more than 375,000 foundations, corporations and individuals.
In addition, Tedros spoke about research into COVID-19 treatment and its progress so far.
"We are tracking more than 700 clinical trials globally, and in March we launched the Solidarity Trial, to generate data quickly about which treatments were the most effective. More than 3000 patients have been enrolled in 17 countries," Tedros said.
The WHO declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic on March 11. To date, over 4,9 million cases and more than 326,000 coronavirus-related deaths have been confirmed on a global scale, according to the WHO data.
