Good morning, colleagues.
Welcome to this press briefing of the UN Information Service at Geneva of Tuesday, 16th of February.
I will start immediately with a few announcements and the first one goes to Catherine we saw on behalf of Ankat.
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I have a question for Some members of the committee were concerned that ILO and the HRC are all the three at same time had their press conference on 22nd.
Could you ship it or I don't know if someone from ILO were here also, but I, I wondered if we can't do that on same time.
Of course, I, I, I'm terribly sorry to to hear that.
So I haven't heard which, which day are you talking about?
OK, we'll, we'll have a look and we'll check with colleagues what can be done.
Thank you, Catherine, and thank you, Buddy.
Yeah, yeah, it's just to to reinforce the point of body.
I mean, on the 22nd, it's the it's the beginning of the Human Rights Council.
I mean, there are other days to plan something.
Human Rights Council, we all know it's, it's interesting at the beginning and especially at the end.
But don't plan all these press conference the same day on Monday.
It's just a matter of rational meeting.
So if you can really move this conference higher or two would be highly appreciated then.
OK, I I will explore on what what what we can do.
So we we do have also Sophie Fisher online.
So I hope she has heard what you just said.
Both colleagues Peter, Joe, Catherine I conference the press, the vendor.
It is virtual who he briefed le virtual Catherine, Lord Catherine, Catherine Chanko.
Thank you, Alessandra in in in the Akani Unis meetings, we often raised that please the agency should look at the the the programmes of the others.
I mean, yesterday when WTO did organise a pressure with the new DG, I mean, it was planned at the same time of the press conference of WHO.
And now as Lionel just mentioned, the 22nd is the first day of human rights session.
So please avoid to put all the events on on the same time and the same day.
It would be very kind of you because like that you will get a better coverage.
It's for mutual interest.
And this is a very well, well noted point.
When things go through unis as you as you know, we and we've discussed this with the with the at our meeting, we serve as a sort of a coordination chamber.
Sometimes coordination is not possible, sometimes coordination doesn't go through us.
But I think that all colleagues have well noted what you've just said.
And we will try to make sure that the ankle in ILO press conference don't collide with other important events from the Human Rights Council.
And on that, maybe if Thompson allows me, I will go straight to Sophie so that she can tell us about the other event of the ILO.
Sophie, you have the floor.
We are unmuting you just one second.
Sophie, we are unmuting you.
I will take that back and we will discuss.
However, our issue may well be that the press conference that I'm going to tell you about now is going to be fronted by our Director General.
That obviously puts constraints on the times we have available, but I will certainly take back your concerns, which are well noted.
So let me tell you, leaving that aside, let me tell you about the report we're going to be launching on the 22nd.
It is the World Economic and Social Outlook 2021, frequently known as the WESO.
This edition examines how digital labour platforms are transforming the world of work and the effects that that'll have on employers and workers.
It will look at 2 main types of digital labour platform.
First, the online based web platforms where tasks are performed online and remotely by workers and secondly, the location based platforms where tasks are performed at specific physical locations.
Examples would be delivery workers and taxi drivers.
The report draws on the findings of IMO surveys conducted among about 12,000 workers in 100 countries worldwide.
It also includes interviews conducted with representatives of 70 businesses in various sectors, 16 platform companies and 14 platform worker associations.
It include it explores regulatory gaps and reviews a number of initiatives undertaken by governments and social partners to bridge these gaps.
As I've mentioned, the Ilo's Director General, Guy Ryder will be launching the report at an embargoed virtual press conference.
Currently this is scheduled for 11 AM Geneva time, that's 10 AM GMT on Monday the 22nd.
The content will be embargoed until 1400 Geneva time on the 22nd, which is 1300 G.
We'll send you the full report in English with a press release and executive summary in English, French and Spanish.
We hope to be able to do this by Friday the 19th of February.
If you want to set up interviews or have any questions, you can contact me or e-mail newsroom at ino.org.
Thank you very much, Sophie.
Let me see if there are other questions for you.
Yes, it's again a question of organisation.
On Monday morning, as my colleagues already mentioned, we'll have a a number of foreign ministers, ministers of human rights, probably Madam Bashali as well, and this will obviously be on centre stage on the agenda on Monday.
If possible, we could move this briefing by Mr Ryder to Friday, for example, or any other day.
The mail is is well noted.
Then we also know that on Monday, not only the opening of the Human Rights Council, but there is also a traditional press conference by WHO on Monday afternoon.
So we will try to discuss with colleagues what's the best options are for the for the not to have too many things on on on Monday and we will let you know as soon as possible.
Next on my list for the announcement is my it's, it's WFP.
You don't have a press conference on the 22nd already, right?
No, I will not have a press conference on the 22nd, at least for now and I won't be planning any in light of the clash of events.
Good morning to you all and bourgeois Tous.
South Sudan as you know and is a country in crisis, but it continues to face the highest levels of food insecurity since the country declared independence 10 years ago.
A hunger crisis looms with 7.24 million people, which is about 60% of its population is increasingly hungry due to chronic sporadic violence, extreme weather patterns and the economic impact of COVID-19.
We are extremely concerned with the hard to reach areas in about 6 counties which are at risk of famine according to the Famine Review committee that said that released a report in December.
So later today we will release new footage showing all this and more.
I hope you will have space in your calendar for it.
Thank you very much Thompson.
And then my last announcement is from Yance on my left.
Yance, you have a new formation pledging conference.
Thank you, Alexandra and good morning, everyone.
On the 1st of March, we will convene with the governments of Sweden and Switzerland a virtual pledging conference to urgently raise funds for the world's worst humanitarian crisis in Yemen.
It will be a moment of reckoning for everyone involved in relief work in Yemen.
We are at the moment running the entire operation on a sort of austerity budget at the same time that a famine is looming on the horizon.
We have heard the recent warnings about rising child malnutrition and hunger, but these are not problems that developed overnight.
There are consequences of continued conflict and the drying up of supports to keep the international relief operation running.
In 2020 or last year, aid agencies have been operating with about half as much money as they did in 2019.
That is 1.9 billion last year against 3.6 billion received in 2019, when the generosity of donors helped stave off famine.
We need to get back to that level of funding.
Aid agencies have already been forced to close or cut down programmes.
We need to turn this perverse situation around and just sustaining existing humanitarian operations will not be enough.
We need to scale them up.
We're finalising the requirements for the 2021 humanitarian response plan.
It is likely to be at the level of 2019, which was 4.2 billion, because people are facing the same level of famine risk today as they did then.
So the pledging conference the 1st of March, every dollar or euro or any other currency counts.
So far, 230 million have been received at humanitarian funding for Yemen.
So far from enough, I have sent you the media advisory with the details of the event, but in a nutshell, it will begin at 3:00 PM Geneva time, Monday the 1st of March.
You can follow it on UN Web TV with remarks from the Secretary General and the Foreign Ministers of Sweden and Switzerland.
Then the donor delegations will clutch their support and in the end we will have a question and answer session with Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock and ministers from the two Co hosts, Sweden and Switzerland.
That will be around 7:00 PM.
Because of the logistics of it, we ask you to send your questions to me or my colleague Hayat.
You can send them in English, French or Arabic in advance.
You can do that from now basically, and up till 2 hours before the closing of the event, so up till 5:00 PM on Monday, the 1st of March.
So at that time you'll have heard of course, the opening remarks and a good chunk of the pledges that are coming out on the day.
So you have the advisory.
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask me now or between now and the 1st of March.
Let me see if there is any question body.
What do I so he he mentioned to return to UK and what's the new process about his successor and the win will finish the his montage.
But I'm, I'm sorry, the, the order quality was quite bad.
But if I understood correctly, yes, Mr Lewcock has, has announced that for many family reasons he has decided to, to step down and will return to the UK.
He is successor and he, he will stay of course, until a successor has been appointed.
That is a process that's in the hands of the of the Secretary General from now on.
Yes, my question is related to the, the pledging conference of March the 1st.
Could you please tell us when you had such a conference the last time and among the pledges, how much money did you get?
Because between the pledges done during a conference and the money that you are really getting, is there a big gap or are most of the states in fact fulfilling their promises?
I don't know if you hear me because it's Catherine.
We couldn't hear the answer of the ends to my question.
There was no sound there.
There is no sound, so I I don't know if I'm the only one that got the problem, but there's since Yen's tried to answer my question.
I mean I was unable to to hear it.
So maybe Katherine is not the room.
Let's try again with it is working now it is working.
Thank you for confirming.
Emma, can we try again with you and then otherwise I'll ask you to send a question to to Yensa.
Maybe Yens then afterwards can repeat his his answer to Katherine.
Hi, yes, Emma Thomason from Reuters.
I also couldn't hear that.
Now it works well with you.
Yeah, I also couldn't hear that last answer.
It seemed like the the mic was muted.
But anyway, I have a, a question which kind of relates to the previous one, which is, you know, given how poorly the, the response was defended last year, could you tell us, you know, what kind of push is being made to raise funds beyond the conference?
You know, how, how is it going to be different this time around?
Can you answer the two questions again?
Yes to, to take the last question first.
Fundraising is not only pledging conferences, as you all know, it's happening all the time.
We are fundraising every single day of the year from the highest level in direct consultation with ministerial level in the different donor capitals.
So we are constantly pushing on this, not only us, but everybody who is involved in the humanitarian response plan, which is a large number of United Nations agencies and international NGOs.
We are all trying to raise money all the time.
Now of course this is a huge amount of money, we know that, but it's also the world's largest humanitarian crisis.
On Catherine's question, the the event last year, the pledging conference where it was Co hosted by the United Nations and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
At that conference we received 1.35 billion in pledges.
It was relatively late in the year, I believe it was in June, and the level of pledges was simply not big enough.
It was simply not big enough.
So the problem was less, not so much, not to say not at all that pledges were not paid.
It was simply that pledges were not made in the first place.
I don't see other questions for Jens.
Jens and I go to our next speaker with Babar Baloch from the Refugee Agency.
Babar, you have a press, You have a briefing item on the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Yes, we are raising alarm on the situation in eastern DR Congo.
Unit CR, The UN refugee agency is alarmed at ongoing atrocities carried out by armed groups in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, which have become part of a systematic pattern to disrupt civilian lives in still fear and create havoc.
In 2020, Unit CR Partners registered a record of more than 2000 civilian killings in the three eastern provinces of DRC, including Ituri in North Kivu and in South Kivu.
The majority of these attacks were attributed to armed groups.
The killings and kidnappings have continued in North Kivu in 2021 as well, where attacks have also been directed against displaced civilians.
On 24th of January, an armed group killed two men and seriously injured six others in an attack onto a site which hosts displaced people in North Kivu's Masisi territory.
A week prior to the recent attack, three people living in Kuvui displacement site in Masisi as well, which is supported by UNITIA, were kidnapped during raids by an armed group.
This group has also imposed a 7:00 PM curfew in the area, after which they visit the residents house to to force security payments.
UNITIA and our partners have heard numerous testimonies from people who have survived this targeted violence.
Between December 2020 and January 2021, at least 7 incursions by armed groups into five different sites have been reported in the Masisi territory.
More than 88,000 displaced people reside in 22 sites supported by Unit CR and the International Organisation for Migration, our partner and sister agency IOM.
Many others live in spontaneous sites, while some 90 percents are accommodated in host communities.
Attacks by armed groups are carried out on suspicion of collaboration with other groups or the Congolese security forces.
Some of these sites are under ****** from multiple armed groups.
Civilians find themselves trapped in the middle of confrontations between these groups.
UNICR has received reports of armed groups forcibly occupying schools and homes, prohibiting school activities and attacking health centres in Moisei, in in in Mesesi territory and Luboro territory.
In November 2020, armed groups introduced illegal taxes on people who want to access their farms in their villages of origin.
This has cut many from their only source of food and income.
The displaced people cannot afford to pay these imposed taxes as they have no income, thereby compounding the situation.
Unit CR is calling on all actors to respect the civilian and humanitarian character of displacement sites and who is advocating for swift and independent investigation into the crimes committed so the perpetrators can be brought to justice.
Thank you very much, Babar.
Yes, thank you for taking my question.
It sounds like there's mayhem going on in the eastern part of the Congo there and a lot of attacks taking place by armed groups.
But I mean, what are these armed groups?
Is there any connection between them or they just sporadic groups?
Is there is there any linkage?
Do we know who the groups are?
Is is it possible to elaborate on who are the armed groups and who are the backed by?
I mean, this is a heartbreaking situation for for the civilian population and who are also displaced and have been displaced multiple times as well, running away from violence and now being even attacked at the displacement sites.
And these are very remote locations in, in that sense.
In the eastern part of of DR Congo.
There are many groups that that are being mentioned.
I've tried to get hold of, in terms of the names of, I got a few names, uh, Naitura, there's one called APCLF, uh, and another one NDRC, but there the many, many armed groups which are operating over there.
Uh, so people are caught up in this confrontation of the armed groups who attack, come to come to attack civilians at the displacement site, suspecting them of collaborating with other groups or, or the security forces as well.
But indeed, it is a situation of chaos and mayhem for civilians in this part of DRC.
Thank you very much, Lisa.
Baba, I'd like to ask you what what is actually the tactic if if they really think think about this of the armed groups of specifically targeting civilians.
I mean, why are they doing that?
Is this this kind of mafia gangster tactics of a lot of extortion or are they really concerned about other things?
And then you talk about the need to increase security or protection.
It hasn't seemed to work until now.
What is it that you proposed that might actually work to protect the civilians and also humanitarian workers who perhaps may be at risk?
Indeed, the tactics are it is like systematic pattern to disrupt civilian lives, instil fear and create havoc by attacking displaced sites.
Unarmed civilians who are being hosted over their extortion and illegal taxes is another way for these armed groups to operate.
But they are going after the civilians who are in the displaced sites who are far away from any presence of security forces or international forces.
While the Congolese army's military operations against militia groups are more often successful than in the past, the armed forces do not have the capacity to maintain and control of the areas they secure.
So thus leaving space for armed actors to reclaim those areas and to impose themselves on on the local population.
So our ask as as humanitarians and also our ask for the safety of, of the civilian is increased presence of, of, of the security forces in in the area.
So, so people are saved from, from these ongoing attacks which have continued last year and this year as well.
I have a hand up from somebody who has not been spelling its name out.
So if this person can identify himself or self give the floor later on.
Babar, you stay with us anyway for a few more minutes, right.
So I will now go to the last speaker of today, but definitely not the least Margaret Harris.
We stay in the DRC and also in Guinea put an update on Ebola.
Margaret, good morning, everyone and thank you very much.
We, my Director General yesterday in the briefing described to you that we have two ongoing Ebola outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
And I'm just going to give you a little bit more detail.
So these Ebola outbreaks are now the 12th and 13th outbreaks we've recorded.
And if you remember, we had an 11th outbreak in Mandaka in Ecuador that ended on the 18th of November last year.
Then we had the 10th outbreak in North Kevu that ended also last year, 25 June 2020.
Oh, we had a 9th outbreak also in Mandaka, which ended in 2018.
And of course, a very large West Africa now Ebola outbreak from 2014 to 2016.
So these outbreaks are really, really telling reminder that COVID-19 is not the only health ****** on the continent of Africa.
And we've also heard about the threats to people's security and livelihood.
So while much of our attention is on the pandemic in the African region, WHOE is continuing to monitor and respond to many, many other health emergencies.
I'll start with an update on Guinea.
So this was notified on the 14th of February 2021, the Ministry of Health informed WHO of a family cluster of Ebola virus disease in the sub prefecture of Gueke in Zen in Zerocore in Guinea.
Between 18th of January, 13th of February reports came.
Reports of suspected Ebola cases had came to the Ministry of a family cluster.
The suspected people with the suspected cases had symptoms of diarrhoea, vomiting and bleeding, classical symptoms of hemorrhagic fever after attending the burial of another relative, a 51 year old nurse on the 1st of February.
However, with the expertise and experience belt so so we now know there are 7 cases, 3 confirmed, 4 probable in Guinea and three of those have died.
We have identified 115 contacts and the majority of those have been traced, that's 109.
The contacts are in Zerichoya but also in Conakry, so with confidence, with the experience and expertise built during the previous outbreaks that the health teams in Guinea are on the move to quickly trace the path of the virus and curb further infections.
But it certainly will be a big job and WHO is supporting the Guinean authorities to set up testing, contact tracing, treatment structures and to bring the overall response to full speed.
We've also contacted our country offices in surrounding countries to to activate and they are activating preparedness plans right now.
Vaccines will also be shipped and the ultra cold chain facility set up.
Now that's the Guinea outbreak.
We also have an outbreak going on in North Keevu.
There does not, there is no connection between the two.
We've not seen any evidence of any connection they but they are going on at the same time in North Kiva.
This is happening in Boutembo, near Boutembo, N Kiva.
We've got 4 confirmed cases, including two people who've died from two health zones, that's Vienna and Katwa.
Contact tracing is ongoing.
We've identified close to 300 contacts who are being followed in four health zones, that's Vienna, Boutembo, Katwa and Museena.
Vaccination has already started in the Katwa Health zone, and some healthcare workers have already been vaccinated.
And therapeutics, Remember, during the big outbreak in North Kivu, therapeutics were tested and trialled, and it was found that that there were two therapeutics that are very effective against Ebola.
And those therapeutics are now being moved from Kinshasa so that people who are confirmed patients can receive treatment.
The real reason for talking to you is what needs to be done to prevent Ebola from speeding?
What can the international community do?
We've learned many lessons from previous outbreaks and these include having the strategic response plan and, and getting it in action early to guide and coordinate the interventions.
What is critical is decentralising the operations to the lowest level, making sure your operations are where the community are and that the the community owns the operations, that your work is community centred and that you work with the community.
A1 size fits all approach to community engagement isn't effective.
Every community's in unique and engagement has to really, really be hyper contextualised or affected communities.
That's the lesson we learn each time and each time we improve on that and need to improve on that.
So communities, I'll ask for responders who are local, familiar and speak local languages and WHO.
In previous outbreaks, communities asked for responders who are local, familiar and speak local languages.
And WHO and response partners have heard this work, have heard this feedback, and are working to place local workers on vaccination, disinfection and other response teams.
Lastly, of course, integrating innovation and research into the response speeds up the availabilities of medicines and technologies.
As I mentioned, we now do have treatments for Ebola.
We now do have vaccines because that work to speed up innovation research was done and is ongoing.
I will finish there now and take any questions and questions there are.
Apologies, it's not a question on Ebola, but on, on this new discovery or whatever you want to call it in Israel, the EXO CD24 spray, nasal spray government of Israel is claiming that is a big hit that it can have a major impact on COVID.
My question, has this been approved by WHO?
Do you have any information about this?
Has there been any requests for you to consider this as a tool?
I do not have any information on this.
As you know, we do get a lot of different countries around the world are looking at all kinds of different treatments and indeed quite often do come back to us.
I will have to check with our research and development team to see if if in fact there have been those conversations.
I'll get back to you with any further information I have.
Actually I have questions on Ebola in DRK and Green Air.
So first, I would like to ask you, should we expect another massive outbreak since we have like 2 separate outbreaks of Ebola in two countries, which as you said are not connected?
Second question is, have started the research on whether these two outbreaks are coming from the new strain of Ebola.
Could it be the new strain of Ebola?
And the first question and the last one, it's about vaccination campaign that started in DRK, because last year, if I remember correctly, there was a vaccination campaign and huge one in Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo and still we have this new outbreak.
So do you think that could this mean that the vaccines actually were not effective against the filler or they are not effective against the current strain?
Those are all very good questions.
So on the 1st the very the huge outbreak we had was 1 involving initially Guinea and then moved very quickly to Sierra Leone and Liberia and moved silently.
And one of the big factors there was it was in an area that had no experience whatsoever of Ebola.
So now it is in the, the two separate places it we are seeing these outbreaks in are both, uh, regions, countries and health systems that now have a lot of experience of Ebola and have moved quickly to identify and, and and respond.
So we expect that that experience will make a very big difference.
But of course we are providing all support necessary on the on your second question, yes, we had, we are sequencing the viruses in both the different both areas and we're looking at whether or not it arose say perhaps from somebody in the community who, who it was it a what we call a recrudescence where it's somebody's had it in their body and it reappears or is it, is it, it hasn't arisen to know.
So we will have that information later.
The third question you mentioned about vaccination, again, vaccination is something that we are following and and you understand more about how long effectiveness lasts when you follow the individuals who've been vaccinated.
And in indeed once we have more information about the nature of the virus, we can answer that question.
But at the moment, those questions are we, we don't have the scientific data to answer that particular question.
Thank you for giving me the floor.
I have questions on not on the on the Ebola.
Yeah, I, I, it's, it's very difficult on the platform to know who's has questions on what.
So I one after the others.
Just go ahead If my before my guard is fine.
OK, so on the mission in China yesterday, they, they in the press conference, they, they mentioned that there's going to be this report and a press conference.
But do you have a time frame when is this going to we are going to have this report?
And then a second question on vaccines.
One thing is vaccines and another one is vaccination.
So do you have guidelines on vaccination for example, we know that the priority is the health personnel.
We know that older people, but older people were in this big cities or in the countryside or I mean, I have a questions on that on that side.
And then yeah, well, that, that is basically OK.
On the China mission, yes, the plan is to have once the report is finalised to have a press conference with all the people from the team involved.
We don't have an exact date.
We're hoping that that's within the week, but I don't have a precise date to give you on the vaccination.
We have quite a lot of documents and quite a lot of guidelines that probably the most interesting for you when you're looking at who should be vaccinated and how you prioritise that is the SAGE framework that was actually brought up last year.
But I'll, I'll send a link so you can see it again, because it actually goes through all the different groups and, and beyond all the people, it goes into the different frontline workers and, and how a country might make those decisions about prioritising.
So it's a very useful and interesting document and I'll send that along with my notes.
Our colleague from UNHCR described the security mayhem that is going on in North Kivu at the moment.
How is this affecting the general health services, the spread of Ebola and The Who operations in that part of DRC?
It's a very good question because as you know insecurity adds a much a higher level of complexity and certainly makes it much more difficult to do the work that's already difficult because you're in a geographically difficult location as well.
We have had a lot of experience of working in this area in of **** end security and one of the critical lessons we learned that was what I mentioned before that you work closely with the community and you understand what the community concerns are and you involve communities in your teams.
We have found that the more you do that, the more effective you can be.
We do have a problem, Emma, with your sound.
We'll try again in a moment.
I have a couple of questions too.
Number one is related to Ebola.
First, it is apparently you find a very efficient vaccine against Ebola.
So why aren't you organise a campaign, organising a campaign of vaccinations in the regions that seem to be the most affected by Ebola?
Because it's always the same regions that are apparently affected?
That's my question #1 my, my question #2 is in fact a follow up on on the 1 of Jamil.
I did also address the same question about the nasal spray that has been manufactured in Israel already a couple months ago and WHO never got back to me to see if they found that it was a good solution or a good treatment that could complete the other the other vaccination and other treatments.
And my my third element is that I'm trying to go on your website, meaning The Who website to access the board with the different vaccines.
And I have always an image that is popping out about asking me requesting a code.
So I think you have a problem.
I know that it's not the first time.
So could you please ask your department in charge to to check that please?
We do have a very effective vaccine.
The decisions about doing I think what you're talking about doing preventive campaigns in areas that seem to have problems, that is a decision that's made at country level and also it's made in terms of supply.
Remember this vaccine yes, effective, but was an experimental vaccine.
I only received some levels of approval pretty recently.
So in order to do those mass, mass campaigns, you have to have a lot of different things in place.
And but certainly I, I that sort of work would be work.
That would be considered on.
But but you're talking about mass preventive campaigns.
I, I presume so at the moment the vaccine is used for reactive campaigns.
So, so for vaccinating around a proven case on the, you mentioned the nasal spray.
I, I hope it wasn't me you asked because I don't recall ever hearing about this one before.
But I will certainly, as I said, follow up for you and find out what we know and whether or not the developers of this particular treatment have come to us for putting it in our our different evaluation, our different studies and our different trials.
And on the third, sorry about the website.
It shouldn't be doing that.
It's, it's certainly the information about the different vaccines is public information.
So that shouldn't be happening.
But I'll check with the the web team.
Apologies, I'll answer in English because my French is really not up to complex technical answers, but I did get your question.
So the first you're saying how come we've got another outbreak since they declared the end 2020?
We have found again, once you have had an Ebola outbreak, it it it will or it is likely that it will recur.
We're seeing again, we've seen several outbreaks in Mandaka, in equator.
Now we don't know if this is down to Ebola persisting in the human population or if it's simply moving again from the animal population.
But the genetic sequencing that's ongoing will help us with that information.
You ask a very good question about whether what what would it be like if a person with Ebola also got COVID?
I think the answer there is, of course, we don't want that to happen to anyone.
So all the actions to prevent transmission of both these diseases are critical.
Thank you very much, Lisa.
Let's see where do I, where do I begin on the, on the vaccinations Just to continue on Peter's question, the, the will you be vaccinating health responders and also members in affected communities?
And you've mentioned that it was going to be reactive and not not preventive.
But how will you go about in terms of vaccinating people then, since you're dealing with two pandemics and both of them are very costly?
How are you going to manage this?
Do you have any idea yet how much money you're going to need, whether you're going to make any sort of an appeal for this?
And then I was going to West Africa and Guinea, as you rightly say, neighbouring countries, Liberia and Sierra Leone, all of all of them, all three countries have had unfortunate experiences with this.
Are Liberia and Sierra Leone at the moment taking protective measures, certain precautions in order to prevent the virus from travelling across the borders to them?
And if you could send your notes, it would be much appreciated.
So I should clarify, indeed, we, we vaccinate the health workers in the area and in in fact, I think looking at the numbers that we have already begun vaccinating quite a few healthcare workers in DRC.
So what I meant by not though, I, I meant that we have not at any point had those preventive mass campaigns that you have between outbreaks.
But any kind of vaccination you do is preventive because you want to ensure that you block transmission on your block development of disease by by doing vaccination.
So sorry if that was a bit confusing.
The second thing you ask, money, yes, it it, it will be necessary to raise considerable funds.
We always find these outbreaks expensive because of the nature of where it is.
And one of the important areas of expenditure is indeed in preparedness.
So we have already alerted the six countries around including of course Sierra Leone and Liberia and they are moving very fast to, to prepare and be ready and to, to look for any potential cases.
Your last question was, are we expecting a massive outbreak or so I'm just looking at my notes are terrible.
Your last question, Lisa, sorry, I miss I, I've I've not noted it down.
It was just a request for your note.
Well, Emma, so she, she couldn't speak, so I'm going to ask her questions.
So The Who Rep and Conakry said yesterday there were some issues getting vaccines to the area quickly, but they were working with the authorities to fix them.
We're just wondering what the issues are.
And second question, in the earlier Ebola outbreak, there were there were many incidents of people responding negatively or even violently to attempts to get the epidemic under control, including an attack on the MSF treatment centre.
Are you worried that there could be such a reaction this time around?
And if so, why or why not?
Yeah, the issues around getting the vaccine.
So there are a number of issues.
First of all, you have to recommission the cold chain, ensure that the cold chain's working at all levels.
So remember, this is a vaccine that requires an ultra cold chain, something everybody's now very familiar with, because a couple of the COVID vaccines also require an ultra cold chain.
It's got to be stored at -70 So before you get the vaccines, you've got to make sure that you've got the ultra cold chain facilities working at arrival in in the airport.
Also that you've got the facilities at the actual place.
We have different carriers called Artex and so on, but that all has to be put in place.
Your second question is very is critical and that's why I really emphasised the lesson we have learned, the lesson we continue to learn about starting with community engagement, starting with the community at the centre of your response.
So not coming in, just bringing things, going to the community, listening to them, helping and listening to what their concerns are, what they understand about what's going on and finding ways to ensure that they own the response as much as possible so that you can have people from the community in the various teams, including the vaccination teams, the disinfection teams.
So it is the people themselves managing the response, not outsiders coming in and imposing something that makes people frightened and concerned.
Thank you very much, Margaret.
And I've got Kasmira on the line.
Questions have been answered, but I had a more of a technical question on to what How extensive will the vaccination campaign be and will you be drawing?
Earlier this year, you announced the creation of a Ebola vaccine stockpile, which I believe is based here in Switzerland.
Will you be drawing down on that stockpile?
On the second, the stockpile, I'm not sure.
I haven't got day detail about exactly where I presume that is the most likely means of providing the vaccines, but I'll double check with you.
So I don't have that information in front of me.
Indeed, normally the vaccination is done around reported cases and all sort of frontline workers, but again, these are decisions that the local authorities make in terms of what their community, what their community needs or, or, and also, of course, what is feasible.
Again, for the last request for the floor, I, I, I don't know who's asking the floor.
So please identify yourself if you want to take the floor and ask a question.
And Margaret, thank you so much for all these extensive answers.
Before we leave the issue of COVID, as usual, we have promised we will keep you informed about the cases at the UN Secretariat staff in Geneva.
And as of last night, we had a total of 200 and 24224 colleagues in Geneva UN Secretariat that tested positive for COVID-19.
This is a commutative number since March 2020.
This leaves me with a few announcements for you.
First of all, speaking about press conferences, just a reminder of the press conference that the Human Rights Council President, Ambassador Nasat Shamim Khan will hold on Wednesday, 17th February at 10 AM.
This is an hybrid press conference.
On the 46 regular session that, as we have mentioned before, is starting on the 22nd of February and last until the 23rd of March, the Conference on Disarmament has been having this morning a public plenary meeting, the first one under the Presidency of Ambassador Gonzalo de Barros Caravallo in Mayo.
Morale of Brazil, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, which opened yesterday, its 78th session, will meet in public next Thursday at 3:00 PM to have a dialogue with representatives of the civil society.
Next week, on Monday, they will begin the consideration of the report of Denmark and the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which also opened yesterday.
Its 79th session, which will last until the 5th of March, will begin next Wednesday, 17th February.
The review of the report of Finland.
The other report to be reviewed during this session is the one of Latvia.
So these are the announcements on the events.
Then I would like to remind you for those who have already seen our message, but inform you also that sorry.
Ahead of the 5th UN Environment Assembly, which will take place online for the first time on 22nd and 23rd of February, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, together with the Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme, Inger Anderson, we'll launch a new report entitled Making Peace with Nature.
This will happen at an online press conference, which will take place at 5:00 PM Geneva time on Thursday, 18th of February.
This new report lays out the gravity of hurt, triple environmental emergencies, climate, biodiversity loss and pollution through a unique synthesis of findings from major global assessments.
It flags the interlinkages between our environmental and development challenges and describes the roles of all parts of society in the transformations needed for a sustainable future.
We have sent you some embargoed material and also the name of the colleague in New York in the Office of the spokesperson to with which with whom you have to record if you want to attend this press conference and be able to ask questions to the Secretary General and to the Executive Director of UNEP.
And as I said, you can also.
This is also on the occasion of the 5th you an environment assembly, and if you wish, you can also follow the work of the assembly through by registering through a link that our colleagues from UNAP Geneva have sent to you.
If you haven't received it, please just let me know very briefly on Friday at the Munich Security Conference, the Secretary General suspected to give a some remarks.
We will give you more information on that very soon.
And last but not least, I would like to invite you all to join us to celebrate International Mother Language Day, which will be marked by the UN Geneva on Friday 19th of February.
On this occasion there will be an online screening via via Webex of the award-winning feature documentary film called Colours of the Alphabet on Language and Childhood in Africa.
The event will be open by the Director General of Union, Geneva Titanovalovaya, with an introduction by Doctor Alistair Cole, film director and Professor Nick Higgins, Film producer.
Prior to the screening, until the 21st of February, you will also be able to test your knowledge of modern languages by an online quiz and the name of the five winners will be announced on the 22nd of February.
There's a whole programme for this International Day that we will be sending to you just after the briefing.
And I think I have asked.
I've told you all I had on my list, if there are no other questions looking at the platform, there is none.
So thank you very much and we will come to you with more details on the programme of the 22nd of February.
