How to respond Portugal to an emergency like a pandemic? Project praised by WHO | WHO
The director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, congratulates Portugal this Thursday for being a pilot country in the Universal Health Preparedness Review, saying he is “looking forward” to knowing the results at the World Health Assembly. .
“Congratulations, Portugal, for leading the Universal Health Preparedness Review. Public trust, a resilient health system together with multisectoral participation are the pillars of preparedness. [Estou] listen to hear your WHA experience [Assembleia Mundial da Saúde, em português],” he wrote on Twitter.
A WHO team visited Portugal from 2 to 6 May as part of a pilot project to assess and strengthen the response to public health emergencies.
According to the Directorate-General for Health (DGS), the opening session of the visit, which took place this week, took place in the Infarmed auditorium, in Lisbon, which was attended by Jaouad Mahjour, deputy director-general for the preparation area. for emergencies at WHO Headquarters, by Gerald Rockenschaub, Director of Emergencies Program at WHO Europe, and by Stella Chungong, Director for Health Security at WHO Headquarters.
With this initiative, it will be possible to evaluate a Portuguese response to the covid-19 pandemic and the preliminary results of this first visit will be presented in an Infarmed auditorium.
“The WHO visit to Portugal becomes timely at a time of reflection on the pandemic and the lessons learned, which reinforce the intersectoral mechanisms, resources and equipment with an impact on the emergence of public health emergencies”, said the DGS, in a statement.
According to the DGS, the WHO visit took place within the scope of the Universal Health and Preparedness Review (UHPR), an initiative that “intends to share defense and reinforcement resources with partners in the areas of the environment, animal health, internal administration, equality of gender, among others, in the context of public health emergency preparedness and response”.
“As Portugal is a pilot in this initiative, it is intended that this is an opportunity to fine-tune global instruments for assessing the capacity of United Nations member states”, he added.
Working groups were developed with institutions from different sectors and visits to the North, Lisbon, Tagus and Algarve regions were carried out. The final results of this work will be presented at the World Health Assembly.