UN Secretary-General António Guterres told world leaders gathered in the Brazilian Amazon on Thursday that breaching the 1.5°C warming threshold is now unavoidable, calling the inaction on climate change a “moral failure” and “deadly negligence.” “The hard truth is that we have failed to ensure we remain below 1.5 degrees,” Guterres said in a speech […] Continue reading ->
The United States (US) aims to compel countries that receive its aid to fight HIV, tuberculosis and malaria to share all information about “pathogens with epidemic potential” in exchange. This is according to a US government document, the “PEPFAR [US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief] Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) template”, seen by Health Policy […] Continue reading ->
The year 2025 is set to be among the top three hottest years in the planet’s 176-year observational record, according to the State of the Global Climate Update from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The mean near-surface temperature from January to August was 1.42°C (± 0.12°C) above the pre-industrial average, the report said. Depending on what […] Continue reading ->
The world is heading for 2.8°C of warming by century’s end under current policies, according to a United Nations assessment released Tuesday that finds new climate pledges have “barely moved the needle” despite a decade of international commitments under the Paris Agreement. The projection represents a decline from the 3.1°C forecast in last year’s assessment, […] Continue reading ->
Sexual and reproductive health rights (SRHR) are being restricted, human rights defenders are being silenced, and evidence-based policy is being replaced by ideology – “but we are not powerless or voiceless”, said Dr Tlaleng Mofokeng, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health. She urged governments and organisations to use the “right to health” […] Continue reading ->
Some 80 million Africans are projected to have dementia by 2050 – a fourfold increase from 2015 – and governments need to invest in brain health as an “economic imperative” to mitigate this. This call was made by the Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative (DAC) at a meeting in Johannesburg on Tuesday, on the eve of the […] Continue reading ->
“Inadequate” and “unbalanced” were some of the complaints levelled against the first draft of a Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) system when World Health Organization (WHO) member states met for text-based negotiations in Geneva on Monday. Once agreed, the PABS system will be an annex to the Pandemic Agreement, but several member states at the Intergovernmental […] Continue reading ->