2022 part1

64/ WTO, WHO, WIPO workshop looks at access, use of information resources for COVID-19 response

28 FEBRUARY 2022

Participants from across the world joined a workshop held by the WTO, the World Health Organization (WHO), and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) on accessing and using information resources for the response to COVID-19 on 28 February. The purpose of the workshop was to enhance understanding of the characteristics, potential uses and limitations of particular information sources related to the pandemic

The first session discussed how a range of WTO, WHO and WIPO COVID-19-related resources can support their members in addressing, and recovering from, the pandemic.

The second session featured speakers from UNICEF, the World Bank Group, FIND (the global alliance for diagnostics), the Graduate Institute, the National Institutes of Health and the Global Health Innovation Alliance Accelerator. Speakers highlighted practical ways in which stakeholders can understand and use the information resources and available data for COVID-19 response efforts.

Points raised for future consideration included the connection of various data resources, the importance of coherent information across resources, the utility of expanding resources to include data related to other diseases and how to leverage or improve resources to prepare for future pandemics.

The event is part of the existing collaboration framework between the three organizations, as first highlighted by their Directors-General on 15 June 2021. WIPO Director General Daren Tang, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala agreed that the three agencies will collaborate on the organization of practical capacity-building workshops at the technical level to enhance the flow of updated information on current developments in the pandemic and responses to achieve equitable access to COVID-19 health technologies.

The trilateral collaboration was further reaffirmed at a meeting on 1 February 2022, where the heads of the three organizations committed to working closely together to help overcome the COVID-19 pandemic and its devastating human, social and economic impacts.

Source: wto.org