The World Health Organization (WHO) wants vaccination against Covid-19 to reach all countries in a little over three months, but warned that the drug "is not the solution to all problems".
In the usual press conference call broadcast from WHO headquarters in Geneva, the director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that he wants to “see vaccination starting in all countries in the next 100 days so that health professionals and people in risk are protected in the first place ”.
In this regard, he recalled that the global network Covax, co-managed by WHO, intends to “guarantee to those who need” vaccines for Covid-19.
According to WHO, 46 countries, the majority (38) developed, have already started their vaccination campaigns against Covid-19. The goal set by the WHO for 2021 is to vaccinate 20% of the world population, including the inhabitants of the poorest countries.
Portugal started its vaccination campaign on December 27 with the inoculation of health professionals from hospitals.
The executive director of the WHO Health Emergency Program, Michael Ryan, said that the vaccine, despite being "a major breakthrough, is not the solution to all problems".
"We have to be realistic," he said, emphasizing that it is necessary to "continue with basic measures", such as physical distance, which, he said, has decreased.
According to Michael Ryan, "people are increasing their contacts", which has resulted in a "rapid acceleration" of new infections in all regions of the world.
"The virus is exploiting our fatigue", he argues, warning, in a reference to the new, more contagious variants, that the Covid-19 coronavirus "is more adapted", so it becomes necessary to "fight more effectively".
"We are not managing to break the chains of community transmission," said the director-general of WHO, who warned of the "immense pressure" on hospitals and health services.
The Covid-19 pandemic caused at least 1.994.833 deaths resulting from more than 93 million cases of infection worldwide, according to a report by the French news agency AFP.
In Portugal, 8.543 people died from 528.469 confirmed cases of infection, according to the most recent bulletin from the Directorate-General for Health.
Covid-19 is a respiratory disease caused by a new coronavirus (virus type) detected in late December 2019 in Wuhan, a city in central China.
