An event that is being mooted as one that will generate vital action points towards solving the COVID-19 puzzle that has brought the world to its knees has had over 3,000 participants from across the world confirm attendance either virtually or physically.
Uganda is set to host the World Health Summit more than a year after it was postponed due to the
COVID-19 pandemic that had just hit the country.
An event that is being mooted as one that will generate vital action points
towards solving the COVID-19 puzzle that has brought the world to its knees has
had over 3,000 participants from across the world confirm attendance either
virtually or physically.
Prof. Charles Ibingira, the President of the summit told journalists on Wednesday
that they are hosting 200 delegates on-site next week, raising questions of safety especially now that the country
is under partial lockdown where movement and gatherings have been suspended.
He says this was the last chance given to Uganda to host the
meeting which will have the World Health Organization Director-General Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus as one of the keynote speakers.
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Dr Bruce Kirenga, a lung expert who is the Scientific
Chairman of the meeting says they have planned the meeting to address key
challenges brought afore by the pandemic including questions of vaccine equity,
variants of the coronavirus and how countries especially in Africa will
balance provision of other services amidst a pandemic in its second wave in
many countries.
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The summit was formulated more than ten years ago to advise
the then countries of the G7 on health issues affecting member countries. Makerere
University Ibingira who is a former Principal College of Health Sciences says
was chosen to host this summit because it has been ranked to have one of the
leading medical schools in the world.
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The meeting happens between June 27 and 30 under the theme, ‘Achieving the SDGs and Universal Health Coverage
amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic in Africa’.
However, by this morning, it was not yet clear whether the delegates arriving will be mandatorily tested for COVID-19. One of the organizers told URN that they are still discussing whether to vaccinate attendants with the 175200 doses that recently arrived to cater for those whose second jab was due.
