The Group of Seven wealthy democracies announced plans Friday to strengthen epidemiological early-warning systems to detect infectious diseases with pandemic potential following the emergence of the coronavirus more than two years ago.
Germany’s health minister, who hosted a two-day meeting of
his G-7 counterparts in Berlin this week, said an existing World Health
Organization office in Berlin would be used to gather and analyze data more
quickly.
Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said the G-7 also wants to
increase compulsory contributions to WHO by 50% in the long term to ensure the
U.N. agency can perform fulfill its global leadership role.
The ministers who met in the Germany capital separately
agreed to provide more support for developing new antibiotics that could be
used to treat people infected with resistant strains of bacteria, which kill
millions of patients each year
Lauterbach said the G-7 also agreed to better protect the
global population from the health impacts of global warming, including by
making adaptation to climate change part of medical training.
The G-7 includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the
United Kingdom and the United States.