THE World Health Organisation’s member countries approved an agreement today to better prevent, prepare for and respond to future pandemics in the wake of the devastation wrought by the global coronavirus crisis.

Sustained applause echoed in the Geneva hall hosting the United Nations health body’s annual assembly as the measure, debated and devised over a three-year period, passed without opposition.

The treaty guarantees that countries that share virus samples will receive tests, medicines and vaccines. 

Up to 20 per cent of such products will be given to the WHO to ensure poorer countries have some access to them when the next pandemic hits.

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has touted the agreement as “historic” and a sign of multilateralism at a time when many countries are putting national interests ahead of shared values and co-operation.

Namibian Health Minister Dr Esperance Luvindao, who chaired a committee that paved the way for Tuesday’s adoption, said that the Covid-19 pandemic had inflicted huge costs “on lives, livelihoods and economies.”

She added: “We, as sovereign states, have resolved to join hands, as one world together, so we can protect our children, elders, front-line health workers and all others from the next pandemic. 

“It is our duty and responsibility to humanity.”

However, the treaty’s effectiveness is at risk because the United States — which poured billions of dollars into the frantic work by pharmaceutical companies to develop Covid-19 vaccines — is not a signatory and because there are no penalties for countries that ignore it, a common problem in international law.

The US, traditionally the top donor to the UN health agency, was not part of the final stages of the agreement process after the Trump administration announced in January that the US was pulling out of the WHO and ceasing to fund the agency.