Comments on this year’s World Immunization Week
VIRUS The pre-COVID era, we could only passively admit increased vaccine hesitancy trends in most public opinions. The world is now learning the hard way how vaccination is the most effective public health intervention countries can put to work to protect their populations.
Funding should be provided by the most affluent countries so that COVAX can provide global universal access to COVID-19 vaccines. It is also vital that robust vaccination infrastructures be deployed in every country to protect the world from pandemics to come.
These programmes can ensure that lifelong immunization, arguably a fundamental human right, becomes a universal reality for many other well-known diseases, such as TB, hepatitis B, diphtheria, influenza, and cervical cancer to start with, and, hopefully HIV and Malaria when new vaccines are made available.
Arnaud Bernaert, Head of Health at the World Economic Forum
