While the world is living in the fear of the coronavirus pandemic, officials at WHO have claimed that the next pandemic is likely to be even more severe, with growing need to follow regulatory guidelines and maintaining hygiene.

According to Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO Technical Lead on Coronavirus, some of the countries that have dealt well with the rapidly increasing coronavirus cases are not necessarily those with strong economic backgrounds, but those that have sustained other infectious disease outbreaks.

She said that the world needs to better prepare for the next health crisis, along with training health workers to use advanced technologies to treat patients as well as educating citizens for taking care of themselves for being safe.

In a statement by Mr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Chief of WHO, the UN agency is discovering new things about the deadly virus every day, including the emergence of new variants and its ability to spread faster, make more people sick, and challenge the efficiency of the available diagnosis, treatments, and vaccines.

However, Tedros assured that scientists are carrying out laboratory and epidemiologic studies in the United Kingdom and South Africa, efforts that could help the agency to take next step towards tackling the new virus strain.

The WHO Chief suggested that the countries need to carry out effective testing solutions in order to pick the variants and design ways to cope with it. WHO aims at a fair and equitable distribution of the treatments and vaccines in due course.

Notably, authorities confirm that coronavirus is likely to become an endemic in the global population, stressing that the vaccinations do not guarantee that the infection will completely be eradicated from the world.

Source Credit: https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/12/1080982