A three-day special session of the World Health Assembly (WHA) started today to discuss pandemic preparedness and response, amid concerns over the spread of the new Omicron variant.
The WHA normally meets each May but a special session was called for in a decision adopted by the World Health Organisation (WHO) member states. The special session was the second in the history of the WHO, which was founded in 1948.
Representatives of WHO’s 194 member states will hold talks on new international rules for handling future outbreaks.
A draft resolution currently under review stops short of calling for the establishment of a “pandemic treaty” or a “legally binding instrument,” which proponents say would beef up the international response when a pandemic erupts.
The UN health agency has warned against countries hastily imposing travel curbs. However, bans have been introduced in recent days, with the United Kingdom, European Union, and the United States among those to impose travel restrictions on arrivals from mostly Southern African nations.
Here are the latest updates:
Portugal probes local transmission of Omicron in soccer players
Portuguese health authorities have identified 13 cases of the new Omicron variant among members of a top soccer club.
The Ricardo Jorge National Health Institute said on Monday that one of those who tested positive was a player from the Lisbon-based Belenenses SAD soccer club who had recently traveled to South Africa, where the omicron variant was first identified. The others, however, had not traveled to South Africa.
Those who have been in contact with the positive cases have been ordered to isolate, regardless of their vaccination status or their exposure to possible contagion, and will be regularly tested for COVID-19, the institute said.
Portuguese health authorities were investigating whether it was one of the first reported cases of local transmission of the virus outside of southern Africa.
Portugal also found two positive coronavirus cases when it screened 218 passengers who arrived in Lisbon on a flight from the capital of Mozambique on Saturday. One of the cases was the delta variant and the other one couldn’t be established, authorities said.
