World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus speaks during a press conference in Geneva. FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP
The World Health Organization on Wednesday called for $675 million (613 million euros) in donations for a plan to fight the novel coronavirus, mainly through investment in countries considered particularly “at risk”.
“Today we’re launching a strategic preparedness and response plan…. We’re requesting $675 million to fund the plan for the next three months,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a news conference in Geneva.
“Our message to the international community is invest today or pay more later,” Tedros said, adding that the funding appeal was “much less than the bill we will have to pay if we do not invest in preparedness now”.
Tedros said $60 million of the funds would be for WHO operations while the remainder would go to countries requiring assistance to guard against the deadly virus.
He said WHO was sending 500,000 masks and 40,000 respirators to 24 countries from its warehouses in Dubai and Accra.
Tedros also hailed a $100 million donation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced earlier on Wednesday for virus testing, treatment and vaccine research.
Asked about Britain’s call for its nationals to leave China, Tedros said: “That blanket approach may not help. We encourage all countries to make decisions based on evidence.”
He said an international expert mission being organised by WHO would be leaving for China “very, very soon”.
Local residents search for the avalanche victims in the snow in Neelum Valley, in Pakistan-administered Kashmir on January 15, 2020. – Avalanches, flooding and harsh winter weather killed more than 130 people across Pakistan and Afghanistan in recent days, leaving others stranded by heavy snowfall, officials said on January 14. (Photo by STR / AFP) Search teams found the bodies of 14 people buried by avalanches and heavy snowfall in Pakistani-administered Kashmir Wednesday, with harsh weather hampering rescuers as they race to find any survivors, officials said. The death toll from days of bad weather now stands at 76 in Kashmir, and at least 100 across the country, according to a statement from the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA). Most were killed in Kashmir’s picturesque Neelum Valley, which had been hard hit by avalanches earlier in the week, said operations director of the Kashmiri disaster management authority Saeed ur Rehamn Qureshi. He said “scores” of houses had b
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