30 August, 2021 - Virtual press briefing on COVID 19

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_video link="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YC5eBlN_y2k"][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text][Music] good morning good afternoon good evening to you all and a very warm welcome back to our covid19 press briefing from here in the who regional office in copenhagen denmark a very warm welcome to you all very glad you could join us today we are also honored of course to be joined by my regional director sat to my left here dr hans kluger uh he's going to be joined and it's a great honor for us to uh welcome mr philip curry uh today unicef's deputy regional director for europe and central asia we're very grateful to have you with us sir today we'd also like to uh and we're very excited to hear from um miss janika asatova a teacher in kazakhstan who will be making a short statement after the regional director this morning just to remind you who else we've got on the panel before i pass the floor to dr kluge we have dr richard pebbody our team leader on infectious hazard management here in the who health emergencies program in copenhagen we're also joined by dr siddhartha datta program manager unit lead for vaccine preventable diseases and immunization and a warm welcome also to dr natasha azapadi muscat director of our division for country health policies and systems so without further ado i will welcome you once again and i will pass the floor to the regional director thank you rob and welcome everyone after the summer the epidemiological picture in the double european region comprising 53 countries is mixed we now have 64 million confirmed cases and 1.3 million deaths 33 member states report a greater than 10 increase in 14-day case incidents this high transmission is deeply worrying particularly in the light of low vaccination uptake in priority populations in a number of countries several countries are starting to observe an increased burden on hospitals and more debts last week there was an 11 increase in the number of debts in the region with one reliable projection expecting 236 000 debts in europe by december first factors account for this increase the first is the more transmissible delta variant now reported in 50 countries in the region the second factor is the easing of public health measures and the third is the seasonal search in travel driving a significant growth in case numbers in most countries we are seeing a particularly steep increase in cases in the balkans the caucasus and the central asian republics we must be steadfast in maintaining multiple layers of protection including vaccination and masks vaccines are the path towards reopening societies and stabilizing economies despite this we remain challenged by insufficient production insufficient access and insufficient vaccine acceptance in roughly eight months nearly 850 million doses have been administered with nearly half of the people of the region being fully vaccinated this in itself is a remarkable achievement however in the past six weeks vaccination uptake has slowed down influenced by a lack of access to vaccines in some countries and the lack of vaccine acceptance in others as of today only six percent of people in lower and lower middle income countries in our region have completed a full vaccination series even though nearly three in four health workers in our region have completed a full covet 19 vaccine series there are countries that have only managed to vaccinate one in 10 health professionals there is a clear need to increase production share doses and improve vaccine access so that they may offer a full series of vaccinations to populations everyone everywhere should have the right to receive the full course vaccination is a right but also a responsibility the stagnation and vaccine uptake in our region is of serious concern now that public health and social measures are being relaxed in many countries the public's vaccination acceptance is crucial if we are to avoid greater transmission more severe disease increases in deaths and a big risk that new variants of concern will emerge vaccine septicism and science denial is holding us back from stabilizing this crisis it serves no purpose and is good for no one public participation is vital for successful covet 19 vaccination understanding people's perceptions including their concerns regarding vaccine safety helps countries to inform communities and healthcare providers where and when needed it is imperative that health authorities look very closely into what determines vaccination uptake by population groups and then establish tailored interventions at community level to boost vaccine uptake together with its member states who europe has developed pragmatic tools and guidance to identify and resolve bottlenecks in immunization programs allowing countries to build on other countries good practices these tools are at every government's disposal increasing vaccine production sharing these doses equitably and driving vaccine acceptance and demand are the three fundamental elements needed to deliver on the promise that vaccination can move the european region beyond the pandemic my final points concert children their schools must be open school closures stall academic performance increase the likelihood of children dropping out of education and affects children's mental health our children have suffered greatly over the past 20 months especially those who were already vulnerable and or could not benefit from digital ways of teaching unlike a year ago we are now in a position to keep them safe as millions of children return to school who europe and unicef call for all necessary measures to be taken such that schools are open and remain open these include to implement vaccination strategy targeted at teachers and school personnel and to children above 12 as well especially those with underlying conditions improve the school environment through clean sanitation and hand hygiene ventilation smaller class sizes where possible physical distancing masks depending on the local risk assessment and regular testing of children and staff and above all protect children's mental and social well-being today we are joined by janika asetova a language teacher in kazakhstan who understands these challenges first hand as we enter another school year i am eager to hear how she intends to manage covet 19 measures in her school and classroom in closing i wish to thank janike and all the teachers around the world who have had to navigate challenging times but whom have continued to serve their communities and over future generations thank you thank you very much regional director so on that note i'm going to go straight across to kazakhstan now to janeaka who's joining us on the zoom link that we've established with her to share some of her opinions insight experience um with us today so janeka the floor is yours thank you for joining us we're very grateful we can't actually hear you janeka sorry you may be on mute no i'm afraid we still don't have audio at the moment no janeka we unfortunately we don't have audio we'll come back to you uh shortly i'll come back to you instead i will move on if you'll allow me janeika we'll come back to you in just a few minutes um if we if we can uh move on i'm going to go over to unicef's deputy regional director mr philippe corrie uh to make a short statement as the regional director noted in his opening statement who europe and the unicef europe and central asia office today are jointly calling for schools in our region to remain open and be made safer from covid19 so i'm going to go over to mr philippe corey mr corey i hope that you can join us online yes uh good morning can you hear me we can please perfect so uh first thank you to uh to hans and all the colleagues of who in teaming up for this very important uh call to reopen schools and i'm looking forward to hear also zanerke because she represents quite the number of teachers who are on the front line and i like to thank also i mean i see so many colleagues from the media and thank you to to who to allow us to to address them we need your help it's very serious what's happening the closing of school uh for 28 weeks as an average in europe central asia and we have seen the western balkan and up to and more than one year in some countries like bosnia and of macedonia turkey is extremely concerning it's basically a massive destruction destruction of our social cohesion of our societies on the long run because it is affecting the most vulnerable children you know the children with disabilities living in rural areas girls migrant and refugee children caring for minorities like roma so basically 25 million children particularly the most vulnerable children of our societies have been absent from any form of distance learning over the last few months so it's really something that is questioning ourselves i mean it's on the top of some close to 5 million children out of school already in this region and we already know that more than 19 million children in this region were not even when they were schooled uh achieving you know the level of proficiency in math and reading prior to the pandemic so it's a massive destruction in the making of a social cohesion and of efforts in sustainable development all the achievements we have been uh having so far so a lot is at stake and we need your help to convince government communities to reopen classrooms to our children adolescents across our region and we have worked with uh colleagues from who we are as you know unicef is on the ground you know providing support to governments with guidelines tips working with teachers practically in terms of and the toolkit has been developed in this in this regard to make sure that we are as practical as possible to facilitate proper conditions healthy conditions for this learning but this distraction of learning uh across the region and face-to-face learning is really really a a challenge for our society so it's really important the face-to-face um approach to schooling uh come back uh to our region and this exclusion of any form of learning of the most vulnerable is really something that will be ultimately you know quite a burden for a long-term uh cohesion and investment in in social cohesion and social development so therefore that reopening is really something we need to convey and it's important not only to support governments communities on how to technically and practically uh ensure a healthy uh learning i mean we have seen some good examples quoted by hands ventilation i mean the distancing in the classroom and simple you know of course the washing of hands and of course the mask when needed and it's special attention to to children with underlying conditions so this is all possible we need to re-empower to our parents so that they could support their children and for instance unicef has developed a parenting app uh that would uh give you know good tips for for parents in these conditions and based on the age of a child so we need to be very practical we need to reassure we need to work with teachers we need to address vaccine resiliency by explaining not stigmatizing explaining why vaccination is important and teachers are very important in this regard and we need them because they could also be the advocates you know for vaccination and so they need to be understanding how it works why it is so important and this work with teacher has been also very important for unicef in terms of the capacity to be online you know many of our teachers were not necessarily trained to be teaching and having curriculum online so it was very important to work on this new approach and we have now a new program called learning that is dedicated to teachers to be able to teach and follow the learning the quality of the learning the inclusiveness of the learning online as well and do some kind of blend approach in terms of face-to-face and uh online teaching so they are very much uh the frontliner as well for us and there are key uh you know partners that we wish to to continue to support uh practically underground so i'll stop there because um it's so important to hear na zanerke i hope zanerke can um can be online but really the media support convincing communities government to reopen their schools municipalities mayors decision makers caregivers to ensure that this school will be reopened in best possible conditions and this you know joint effort is only the way to move forward so thank you so much over deputy regional director unicef mr corey thank you very much for those words i'm going to i'm going to take those words and and and go to one of our immediately over to one of our panel members to add a few comments shortly janeaker is still trying to make contact with us so we will come back to her in a few more minutes we'll just give it a little bit more time so i'm going to go over to the panel because quite a few of the questions have related them to the measures um that what member states can adopt to minimize transmission in the virus from schools mr corey's just spoken to that i'm going to go across to one of our panel members dr azerpadi muscat who's the who europe director for country health policies and systems and ask dr muscat if she could add a point or points regarding this question because it's coming natasha from a number of different journalists over the last 24 hours basically what are some of the measures who member states can adopt to minimize transmission of the virus in schools maybe you could add a few points to what's been said thank you thank you very much rob and good morning and perhaps just to start again it bears repeating that schools are not isolated from the rest of the community so now more than ever at this point it's critical for all of us to do whatever we can to keep levels of community transmission down and i would also just like to recall that a year ago to date we had the first meeting discussing schooling and it was a very different predicament and situation for all of us now so many things have changed because we have vaccines available and in many countries teachers have been offered the opportunity to get vaccinated otherwise we continue to call for teachers to be amongst the priority groups for children who are given the opportunity to be vaccinated also to take up this opportunity for parents to allow their children over the age of 12 if they are invited to be vaccinated to do so particularly those children who may be at higher risk of course hans and our colleague also from unicef have mentioned the importance of ventilation in countries where outdoor activities are possible to continue to be able to do this so that we preserve extracurricular activities as much as as possible too mask usage this is often one of the questions that is raised and this wh show we have detailed guidance but just also if i may remind people that we are facing a delta surge delta is highly infectious and therefore it's important not to throw caution to the wind and to be very aware particularly in areas localities and countries where there is ongoing transmission to be able to use masks in the school setting where distancing may not be possible and finally also when it comes to testing and testing strategies we've seen so much evolution over the past year in terms of the tests that are available rapid tests tests that perhaps are less invasive and more acceptable to be carried out on children and over here the importance also of judiciously using testing to avoid mass and blanket quarantines as far as possible so as to be able to move towards more targeted quarantine of children who are truly exposed so as not to disrupt education we anticipate that there will be cases in schools because schools are places where children gather and come together and therefore the importance of not disrupting education through blanket quarantines but using the quarantine appropriately and complementing this with testing and finally the importance of engaging the teaching community as well as children and adolescents in doing whatever they can do to keep transmission down when we convened our high-level group on schooling that has worked really hard and i'd like to acknowledge their work over the past months to be able to come up with these recommendations we also involved the voice of school children and it's incredible how much the children themselves can do if given the right information and equipped and empowered to take decisions to protect themselves back to you rob thank you thank you very much natasha um so thanks very much i'm going to come back because there's a few questions regarding schooling but before i do i'm going to uh go back uh again over to kazakhstan shortly but um before i do that there's a question we've received and i would encourage you all to raise your hands please in the system or write your questions in the chat function the journalist joining us today we have a question from afp from camille bass wallet i think this to you regional director you said it will be some time before we can put the pandemic behind us but what does it take to reach the end of the pandemic tunnel why is it taking us so long regional dwight thank you camilan good to have you back so there are a number of impediments which are in the way to achieve faster the 80 benchmark so first too many people remain hesitant to embrace either the vaccine or the public health measures the second one is that too many countries still struggle to have access to the vaccine itself in our pan european region of 53 countries the third one is that too often countries believe prematurely that the pandemic is over while it is just a wave passing and then they have to return back and next one is that in no regards there is not enough effort or focus on the development of therapeutics in addition to the vaccine but we also believe that we can overcome those with the following three directions the first one top priority is to roll out the vaccination equally so uptake production and sharing of the vaccines and to do this also together the private sector and it doesn't matter whether it's bilaterally or multilaterally what's important that countries with a surplus are not waiting too close to the expiry date because if then they are doing a donation to a country it's very tough for everyone so not to hurt on the vaccines and of course as i was telling the top priority is to reduce vaccine septicism while engaging empowering the communities and if need be to consider mandatory measures for the most exposed population groups and professions this is the first one the second strategy is to implement what i call nuanced approaches within our pan-european context and this includes for example expanding the vaccination programs to children and additional japs i think i was in the united states in august discussing with the authorities the transatlantic operation and discussing also dr anthony foji and we had together the same let's say conviction that a third dose of vaccine is not a luxury booster taking away from someone who is still waiting for a first jab but it's basically a way to keep the people safe the most vulnerable but at the same time we need to share so we need to do it all and finally very important the third direction to get out of it is to maintain a proposed pressure against the virus during periods of tranquility by not surrendering on masks ventilation mobility control and intensified testing policies and if i speak at a global level pressuring the virus starts with sharing all our data thank you thank you very much regional director i'm now going to try and go over to kazakhstan to miss janika asatova a teacher in kazakhstan janaka let's try again to see if we can we can hear you this time please go ahead thank you can you hear me now great we can great to have you with us thank you good afternoon ladies and gentlemen my name is janike i'm a kazakh teacher at astana garden school speaking to you today from the capital of kazakhstan thank you for giving me this opportunity to share my thoughts last year when the world first faced korvik 19 i was at the beginning of my teaching career it was a big challenge for all of us to ensure the continuity of learning in condition of lockdown it was also challenging for students to adapt to the new reality as not all of them had access to a computer device or the internet this created an additional divide you could call it a digital divide everyone suffered teachers and students alike it's amazing how quickly we all learned to adapt because we had no choice if we didn't our students would suffer and education is the most important thing to help children realize their dreams however there came a new problem lots of students start to have mental health problems caused by lack of social contacts young people need to learn in a group environment so they can learn from others i observed that high school students tend to be more stressed and frustrated while junior students were happy to spend hours in front of computer playing the games we include in our lessons online learning has affected not only the well-being of the community but also the quality of education students couldn't get an individual attention when needed it was difficult for teachers to give an extended feedback kazakhstan offered the vaccine to teachers earlier this year and i jumped at the opportunity because i know this would be the only way i could return to in-person teaching while keeping myself and others safe now in just two days time schools in kazakhstan are reopening after the summer holidays and i'm so excited i can't wait to teach my students directly help them with their problems and be a pillar in the community our schools are so important because this is where next generation of scientists politicians and writers are created this is where dreams are made we must support our schools to remain open whatever happens and the most important job is to get vaccinated when we can all of us can do our bit to make sure next generation doesn't suffer the consequences of our actions right now thank you thank you so much america for this testimony and particularly for your professional commitment and your passion as you also represent so many teachers this morning we really appreciate it a lot and very good luck thank you thank you thank you very much thank you regional director we're going to go straight to the journalists now online and i'm going to start with esme milovic from n1 bosnia esmere good afternoon good afternoon um the question is for um regional director and the question is you just recently visited bosnia and herzegovina but you also spoke today about the situation in balkans and that the situation in balkans worries you but what we saw over the last week or so is that the key politicians with whom you met here in bosnia and govinda such as a speaker and deputy speaker of the parliament but also member of the presidency um attended to the large events on which we saw uh absolute and total disregard of um all measures um including not wearing the masks and um disobeying uh social distance and everything and those events where from few hundred to few thousand people um at the place and um also we had a situation where the spouse of the deputy speaker of the parliament mr izzat begovic is also a medical professional and she attended uh uh one of those um events so uh what kind of message that sends to people in vancouver scovina and what we should do to change this um situation to lower the numbers uh in upcoming weeks thank you okay uh thanks very much yes may i'll hand that to the regional director first and then i'm going to go over to dr richard pebberdy thank you esmere and let me speak from a uh original perspective that in countries where the incidence of covet 19 is on the rise and particularly facing new waves all the basic measures apply right keeping the distance wearing the masks hand hygiene strengthening the health system and definitely avoid large mass gatherings unless of course really very strict hygiene conditions can be put in place let me give you one example together with our governing body board we have decided to hold our annual regional committee this is our annual governing board of 53 minutes of health the 13th of september we have decided to hold it virtually exactly because of the epidemiological situation thank you uh next uh dr pebbady would you like to add anything to that yeah and i think thank you very much i i mean i think the points are all very well made and of course as as we heard that one of the key issues driving the increases in transmission that we're seeing across the region has been the spread of the delta variants that has happened over the summer months we know this variant is more transmissible than the previous circulating viruses and is also associated with increased risks of severe disease particularly hospitalization compared to the to the previous circulation viruses so we do need to get back to the basics as we heard the proper implementation of the public health measures to reduce transmission in the community when we start to see increases in transmission and of course the increases in vaccine uptake in the priority groups to really provide protection from them from severe disease from hospitalization and from other severe consequences and we know that the vaccine still provides excellent protection against the delta variants again against severe disease over and out thank you dr peperdy uh next i'm go thank you very much for the question esme next i'm going to go over to peter kenny from the anadolu news agency peter please the floor is yours peter we've got no sound at the moment rob can you hear me yes i can jamie is that that sounds like just jamie it's not uh it's not peter kitty but i'll take the opportunity to ask a question jumping the cube brilliant joining me thank you very much um dr dr kluger thank you very much for your for your presentation i want to just make sure you mentioned your conversation with dr fauci um these who europe this is peter kenny here well now you're cutting on me peter peter if you could just wait a moment we'll just hear jamie's question then i'll come back to you peter thank you um so uh dr kluga you mentioned dr fauci um is it your belief that boosters are needed for um for for uh within within within europe i mean because that's been an issue um so what is your exact stand on that question of boosters and um it sounds to me like you know the who headquarters has been hesitant or has been talking more about the importance of vaccinating health care workers and the vulnerable and particularly impoverished countries that seems to go somewhat against what you seem to be saying about a targeted implement implementation strategy on adolescents who i think if i can sort of maybe paraphrase what who headquarters has said is you know that children are not is quite the high priority so could you just um address your policy on boosters and whether or not there's a slight uh nuance in your position against against wh headquarters in terms of vaccination of children thank you thank you uh jamie so to implement nuanced approaches within our pan-european context is one of the three strategies which i see to get out of this mayhem let's say towards a sustainable control of transmission so we are fully aligned on the principle of equity everyone has really the right to get a full series of vaccines but to start from the children we need to keep the schools open so if you look in the pan-european context if the vaccines are available then yes the adolescents definitely have to be vaccinated because otherwise especially in the context of the delta variant we will face uh many more challenges so absolutely on the booster we have to be a little bit careful because there is not yet enough evidence and i think that's what dr fochi and me were discussing that it goes towards in fact maybe the word booster is not the correct word jaime we should say in additional dose that this ultimately will be seen if if the evidence evolves in that direction as part and parcel of a complete basic regimen so that it's not taking away a vaccine from someone who is waiting but basically an important instrument to keep particularly the vulnerable people safe so that's where we stand thank you thank you very much regional director thanks for the question jamie so i'll go back over to peter kenny uh peter can we now okay thank you yeah thank you jamie for asking my question um i would just like to know dr kluger if you think that these additional jabs or vaccinations whether the debate about this is going to confuse people about the whole system of vaccination because people are saying in some countries it's time for a booster and some countries are offering boosters can you explain something on that thank you yes peter this comes back not only to this question though we have been we meaning countries agencies struggling from the very beginning we have to be careful of making policy decisions within an uncertain context or when like in this case the evidence is not available yet so what's very important to keep the trust in science is to have transparent communication towards the people remember the vaccines that are about the side effects and all the instances so we learned the lesson so we have to explain to the people that the evidence is not watertight that the importance is do it all i think this is a key peter do it all right so there are more and more studies telling that a third dose if previously it was two doses keeps vulnerable people safe like a number of countries more and more are doing in our region but at the same time countries need as soon as possible to share their excess doses and we know there are i have appointed a special advisor on the covet 19 vaccination role out already months ago we have detailed lists of eu israel uk what's the excess which vaccines expiry date and what are the needs in the other countries particularly the east of our region and that's what we are doing i'm doing on a daily basis i call it target health diplomacy speaking to presidents and prime ministers to share vaccines and not only the european region but also with the african region and all the regions thank you thank you uh next i'll go to nikolai skusgard from reuters nikolai yes hello can you hear me yes please go ahead thanks all right thanks uh and just uh a follow-up question to to the to the third jab are you guys in in discussions with any uh eu or european states about the use of boosters is are you are you sort of speaking to countries on a more detailed level about this the maybe contextual use of of sorry third jabs and then [Music] another question um on the and i don't know if this is something you'd like to speak to but on on the origins of the virus um do you guys consider a lab incident in china a scenario that needs to be looked further into also on the backdrop of of this u.s report on the origins that recently came out and so yeah what's your stance on on looking further into the origins of the virus thanks okay thanks very much thanks nikolai i'll first go over to dr siddhartha datto is our regional advisor for vaccine preventable disease and immunization immunization on your first question and then i'll turn the one on origins of virus to the regional director so first siddhartha please thank you thank you rob i hope you hear me well so thank you nicolai for that question in terms of in our engagement with the member states yes indeed i mean we use different mechanisms to number one understand the decision-making process that member states are making in their country for use of this additional doses so just wanted to highlight couple of things here a decision-making process in a country involves the participation of the national immunization technical advisory group of experts who look into the local disease epidemiology the vaccine doses availability vaccine uptake at this point of time of the different population groups and what are the evolving nature of the evidence as uh you know as have been evolving not only for this vaccine per se but around the globe what are the evidences being generated for this additional dose and waning of immunity and etc as you have heard the original director say that any decision the country is making should be based on robust data robust science and reverse evidence and that is what we are also engaged with different member states in terms of the european union member states we are also engaged with european cdc for their discussion around the national immigration technical advisory groups where these decision makings are being discussed in detail but who brings about the available evidence wherein the member states can look into the local context and see what is the evolving nature of science around this topic thank you so much pass it back to europe thank you but the second question will go over to the regional director yes uh nikolai so this is directly this effort is directly led by wgo headquarters and the director general who recently has established a special expert group to look into the origins of this virus but also future novel pathogens and at this stage there is not enough evidence and facts so i think we have to remember that to study the origin of a zoonotic agents takes time this has been the case of mars has been the case of sars can easily take one year and a half up to two years it is not is not easy so in that sense i would say that it's very important to give this study its time and not to jeopardize it at this stage and our exit point is always a good collaboration with the different partners involved because that's ultimately why the united nations were established thank you thank you very much regional director so next i'm going to go across to jan dirk herbermann um who is a german-based gene uh geneva base excuse me german journalist uh with a number of different uh outlets so jan i'm going to go over to you next are you with us yes thank you go ahead can you hear me we can can you hear me okay great um yes uh dr kluger i have a question on vaccine donations do you know how many doses have been donated by countries of the region to other countries and to kovacs and also i'd like to ask you on the vaccine skeptics you you just said that vaccination is a right and also a responsibility so what can be done to convince vaccine skeptics or to pressurize them into getting vaccinated thanks very much jan i'll go to the regional director and then back to siddhartha thank you thanks john yes we have a detailed inventory basically the who regional office for europe serves at what i call a matchmaking forum so from both countries with surplus and in need we have a good uh overview and that's why i pointed the special envoy on that one of course it may be that sometimes it takes a bit of time that if a country bilaterally decides to give donations but we do have also as you may know 31 country offices and that's what we used to try to equally have equity in vaccination roll out this is comp it's what they call covax plus so it's complementary to the covax but we also know that the the kovacs ultimately will go up to 20 percent and the target set by our expert group is 80 percent that's under the first part the second part dr siddhartha will go a little bit more in detail but our principle has been not to blame the people but to try to understand their perceptions i think the key issue here from my perspective is that still too many policies in countries are made based on perceptions assumptions and not on data and that's why among others we established a special unit on behavioral and cultural insights but with this for the details rob maybe we can go to siddhartha of course of course uh we go over to uh siddhartha datta thank you siddhartha thank you rob and and just uh continuing from the point where the regional and director you left they we we strongly feel that any decision that is being made by the country should be based on local data on vaccine uptake and countries as you have heard the regional director mentioned in in his opinion remark that the understanding the reasons behind the vaccination update will allow devising a locally tailored intervention so that's number one the second part is people may have questions and i think this should not be seen as people being hesitant to receive a vaccine this understanding of their quest questions or in any question that they may have any concern that may have both on vaccines and vaccination should be seen as sort of a health seeking behavior of the population they should be seen as their process of going towards an informed decision and informed choice and i think it's extremely important that the governments make effort to listen to address them and be prepared so equipped themselves to answer those questions and extremely this is an extremely important element within the which original office as you have heard the general director say we have the behavioral cultural insights unit one of its kind in the who uh in the entire who which looks into people's perception why people would not be taking a vaccine what are the different factors which are influencing their decision making process that's where wha comes along very context-specific again to work with countries to find out and devise what interventions would work and just one quick you know data that you requested ian about the vaccine donation just to give you a very quick summary that we have received from kovacs that the the you know in the in the wh european region we have received around seven million uh doses being donated from sweden from france the united states of america to our who european uh in the region countries in our double european region but overall several countries have donated around 95 million doses to the covax far for distribution but this is over and beyond the bilateral numbers that are bilateral doses that are being shared by uh by our european union member states to to the to the other countries thank you so much thank you for the question um and also thanks to the regional director and siddhartha for those responses i'm next going to go over to ancho lamela from efe in spain hello can you hear me we can please go ahead yes thank you great uh i got a question for dr kluge in your statement you said that the high transmission is deeply worrying and you mentioned the easing of public health measures as one of the factors denmark has had the epidemic under control for weeks or months face masks face masks are not mandatory anymore and last week the danish government said that they will remove other restrictions in a couple of weeks as the whole regional office for europe is based in copenhagen do you have any thoughts about that thank you thank you so a number of points here the first one is that denmark is a champion in vaccination uptake there is a maximum degree by the population in trust in the vaccine and which translated really in a very high vaccination uptake number one number two the health system is capable to implement really a large-scale testing strategy and it includes genomic sequencing so as the minister manuscript was telling a couple of days ago it does not mean that the country at one point may not have to go back and implement some more restrictive measures but the target is that this would be done locally so if you detect locally some outbreak that then in that local environment some more restrictive measures are being implemented without having to go to large scale having said that we have to like in any other country this has to be followed uh very very closely thanks very much now i'm going to go to two other panel members with this question the first i'm going to go to is richard pebbedy see if there's any points you'd like to make and then to siddhartha i'll ask you both to be brief please thank you thanks rob um i mean not not much to add except to flag that um certainly denmark has a very strong um laboratory based surveillance system in place um which in at very high rates of testing for individuals with acute respiratory illness and also contacts as well um consequently uh that they're able to um utilize that system to maintain levels of transmission at low levels at the moment um both in country and and at the borders as well uh but clearly uh that needs to be flexible um and if they do see increased levels of transmission then as uh the regional director mentions um that would then need obviously tightening your public health measures accordingly over now thank you richard sidata thank you just to uh you know outline the vaccination part of kovite 19 in in denmark as the regional director has you know outrightly mentioned there's a very high vaccination uptake across the population groups in denmark if we quickly look into the numbers people more than 60 years of age according to the data available with which or 98 have completed their series meaning either they they completed the two doses and adults which are under than 60 years of age they have 76 of them have uh received a two dose vaccination series which is indeed a great reflection not only about people's perception and trust on the government but we also would like to acknowledge the effort made by the ministry of health and the government to ensure that they do get access to their information the vaccination is being made convenient and also ensuring that the the the community level based understanding of reasons what were holding some of the people back were then put into place so that there is increased coverage or uptake in the population so i think again going back to original directors they do it all even if they do it all within the vaccination it's no cherry picking but we have to make entire system run behind to make a vaccination update successful great lessons to learn from denmark indeed thank you thanks for those responses and thanks for the question angel i understand jamie you had a second question that we didn't get to could please go ahead jamie keaton jeremy is still with us no okay well in that case i'm going to ask the deputy regional director for unicef philippe if you have any comments you'd like to make before i hand the floor back to hans to make some concluding remarks no thank you very much indeed i mean it was a very good to have this exchange with media and concerns but i just put in the in the chat box you know we i understand that people are concerned about the third job or not uh and where and how but thousands of children are missing their regular vaccination these days polio is back measles is growing and nobody is that much mentioning that you know this entire cohort of children have been missing europe and central asia so this is extremely uh you know worrisome because of the disruption of health services so if media could also bring the attention that you know vaccination is really to be continued because this as a tendency and therefore as colleagues have mentioned we should not stigmatize people who are hesitating we should explain and try to bring trust back because it could jeopardize and we see already some effects all the efforts and investment made in ensuring vaccination against preventable disease that we are used to do across europe and central asia so that if media could also stress that importance of getting you know our children immunized uh as per their regular uh vaccination program that have been made available over the years and saving two to three million children per year uh in the world uh this is what is at stake as well uh not only the third job or not so it's very important that we emphasize the aspect as well so that health system be thinking uh in terms of their capacity of continuing and you know reassuring as well caregivers parents and and community leaders around uh you know vaccinations so that's really what it is all about and as hands it's about you know uh understanding people having studying as well uh behavioral insights and in useful we have also a dedicated um section on that to understand what is uh you know the the narrative that is blocking people to trust vaccination as they used to uh for their children uh before so that's really uh for us also a dimension that we need to uh along at the school reopening to to emphasize and thank you again to um to your interest as media and to our colleagues in which all right thank you philippe thank you to you and the panel members for joining us today a particular thank you to janika and to really as the regional director said all teachers across our region around the world for their dedication and their contribution to our society to our communities they deserve our respect and applause so a warm thank you to janaka and all of them it only remains for me to close the press briefing today uh this press statement by the regional that the regional director made will be available uh on is available online um it only remains for me to say uh take care out there and we'll welcome you back in the not so distant future for another press briefing on cobit 19. thank you very much for your for joining us today you<br><!-- wp:image {"id":1776,"sizeSlug":"large","linkDestination":"none"} -->rn<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img class="wp-image-1776" src="https://en.videoencontexto.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/30_August_2021__Virtual_press_briefing_on_COVID_19_YC5eBlN_y2k.jpg" alt="30 August, 2021 - Virtual press briefing on COVID 19" /></figure>rn<!-- /wp:image 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