United Nations published this video item, entitled “Vaccinations, Myanmar, World Environment Day & other topics – Daily Briefing (4 Jun 2021)” – below is their description.
Noon briefing by Stéphane Dujarric, Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.
Highlights:
– Covid-19/Africa
– Covid/19 Uganda
– Covax/South America
– Vaccinations
– Chad
– Central African Republic
– Democratic Republic Of The Congo
– Mozambique
– Myanmar
– Yemen
– World Environment Day
– International Day Of Innocent Children Victims Of Aggression
– International Day For The Fight Against Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated fishing
– President Of The General Assembly/Stakeout
– Financial Contribution
VACCINATIONS
The UN welcomes the announcement made yesterday by the Biden administration that it will be sharing millions of vaccine doses with both the COVAX facility as well as bilaterally with countries in particular need.
But I also want to add that the Secretary-General is extremely grateful to the United States Government for the inclusion of United Nations personnel and Member States delegates serving in the United States in its national vaccination programme, and for the generous offer to provide vaccines for United Nations frontline personnel serving in the most challenging and dangerous locations around the world. This donation will allow the UN staff to stay and deliver critical services to vulnerable people around the world in a safe and effective manner.
The Secretary-General renews his call to the international community to come together to address the unprecedented challenge of this pandemic, and for countries to share vaccines, particularly with those that are struggling to cope with new surges and variants. There is an urgent need for increased global solidarity to ensure that vaccines are available to everyone, everywhere.
Equitable access to vaccines is a prerequisite for ending the pandemic and kick-starting a strong recovery.
MYANMAR
In Myanmar, the UN Country Team today reiterated their call for protecting of healthcare workers and facilities. They warned of the impacts of attacks on public health, which includes the COVID-19 response, in the past four months since the military seized control of the Government.
To date, there have been at least 212 reported attacks on patients, health workers, ambulances and healthcare facilities, resulting in at least 14 deaths and 51 injuries. This amounts to about half of the total attacks on healthcare reported globally this year.
Our colleagues on the ground stress that hospitals are, and must remain, a place of sanctuary and unequivocal neutrality so that patients can seek care and health professionals can provide care safely and without fear.
WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY
Tomorrow is World Environment Day, and this year, the Day will also mark the launch of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, a ten-year global push to prevent, halt and reverse ecosystem degradation.
In his message, the Secretary-General stresses that we are rapidly reaching the point of no return for the planet. He says that the degradation of the natural world is already undermining the well-being of 3.2 billion people – or 40 per cent of humanity.
The Secretary-General notes that luckily the Earth is resilient, and we still have time to reverse the damage we have done. He highlights that the UN Decade is a global call to action, which will draw together political support, scientific research and financial muscle to massively scale up restoration.
And as part of the celebrations, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the UN Environment Programme
(UNEP), released a joint report on Global Assessment of Soil Pollution. The report warns that widespread environmental degradation caused by soil pollution, due to the growing demands of agri-food and industrial systems and an increasing global population, is getting worse and is one of the world’s major challenges for ecosystem restoration. The full report is online.
Full Highlights: https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/noon-briefing-highlight?date%5Bvalue%5D%5Bdate%5D=04%20June%202021
United Nations YouTube Channel
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