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UN Women/Pathumporn Thongking A healthcare worker checks the temperature of a patient at a hospital in Nonthaburi Province, Thailand.         1 August 2020 Expressing “appreciation for  WHO  and partners’ COVID-19 pandemic response efforts”, the emergency committee convened by the UN health agency’s chief,  made it clear  that there is not yet an end in sight to the public health crisis that has so far infected more than 17 million and killed over 650,000 people. The committee convened by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, under the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR), held its fourth meeting on 31 July. Sustained effort needed In  its statement  following the meeting, published on Saturday, it highlighted the “anticipated lengthy duration” of the pandemic, noting “the importance of sustained community, national, regional, and global response efforts.”   After a

© UNHCR/Alissa Everett Samrawit, a 20-year-old Eritrean asylum-seeker braids her friend's hair at the UNHCR Emergency Transit Centre in Gashora, Rwanda.         30 July 2020 Law and Crime Prevention The UN commemorated  World Day against Human Trafficking  on Thursday spotlighting the essential – but often overlooked - role of first responders who identify the millions of victims worldwide, helping them secure justice, and rebuild their lives. “These are the people who work in different sectors - identifying, supporting, counselling and seeking justice for victims of trafficking, and challenging the impunity of the traffickers,” UN  Secretary-General António Guterres   said in his message  on the Day, which is observed annually each 30 July. ‘True shift’ needed Their role has only become more important in the context of  COVID-19 , particularly as travel restrictions have forced new dangers upon victims, who ar

UN News/Daniel Dickinson A park in Brooklyn, New York, has marked out circles in order to enforce social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic.         30 July 2020 Although older people are among those at highest risk of COVID-19, the head of the World Health Organization ( WHO ) has reminded younger generations that they are “not invincible” when it comes to the disease. Evidence suggests that the spike in cases in some countries is partly due to younger people “letting down their guard during the northern hemisphere summer”,  WHO  chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus  said  on Thursday. “We have said it before and we’ll say it again: young people are not invincible”, he told journalists. “Young people can be infected; young people can die; and young people can transmit the virus to others.” He stressed that the world’s youth “should be leaders and drivers of change” during the  COVID-19  pandemic. Protect yoursel

WFP/Claire Nevill In Harare, Zimbabwe, a single mother of three relies on food assistance from the World Food Programme (WFP) during the COVID-19 pandemic.         30 July 2020 The World Food Programme (WFP) is urgently seeking more international support to prevent millions of Zimbabweans plunging deeper into hunger. The COVID-19 pandemic has aggravated an already severe hunger crisis in Zimbabwe, UN humanitarians warned on Thursday. In an appeal for an additional $250 million to support emergency relief for millions of vulnerable people, the World Food Programme ( WFP ) said that by the end of the year, the number of food-insecure people in the southern African nation, is expected to surge by almost 50 per cent, to 8.6 million. Triple shock That represents around 60 per cent of the population, the agency said in a statement, blaming drought, economic recession and the  coronavirus  pandemic as the main drivers of the cr

© UNICEF/Omar Albam On 23 April 2020, a child washes dishes in the Maarat Misrin camp north of Idlib, Syrian Arab Republic.         29 July 2020 Humanitarian operations across war-shattered Syria are reaching 6.8 million people a month, but a worsening economic crisis is deepening poverty and pushing more and more Syrians into humanitarian need, the  Security Council  heard Wednesday. UN humanitarian affairs chief Mark Lowcock  said  that the United Nations and its partners are working to address operational challenges arising from the Council’s  decision  following weeks of division, on 11 July, to reduce to just one, the number of border crossing through which food, medicine and other forms of aid can pass from Turkey into Syria. The UN is also helping to tackle  COVID-19  in Syria, where the number of confirmed cases remains in the hundreds, but the true number is certainly higher, Mr. Lowcock told the Council’s monthly