After a number of countries including India raised concerns on the `false pandemic' alert by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in connection with H1NI, an independent panel of expert is set to examine the issue at its meeting from April 12 to 14.
The proposed review will cover aspects like how the WHO responded to the recent pandemic situation and how well the world is prepared for future health crisis. The review falls under a planned examination of the WHO's legally-binding international health regulations, which were designed to guide WHO members in case of a global health emergency. The panel is meant to draw up its own plan for reviewing WHO's activities. It is also expected to go into the complaints by some countries that they did not get enough vaccines against the pandemic flu.
A number of member countries including India had expressed concerns on the response of the WHO to the recent H1N1 and sought explanation on the media reports in this regard. WHO had then written to the member countries about the issue and offered to make independent review about the same. Making an intervention in the ongoing Executive Board meeting of WHO in Geneva a few months back, Indian Health Secretary Sujatha Rao pointed out that such news reports were adversely impacting upon the public health measures being undertaken by countries. She also called for greater transparency about terms and conditions on which international vaccine manufacturers were supplying vaccines to countries. In response to this intervention by India, it was agreed that WHO would formally write to National Focal Points in all countries clarifying the factual position about the H1N1 pandemic to quell all doubts that had been created.
The WHO director general Margaret Chan announced at the meeting that the agency would launch a review of the global - including its own - response to the H1N1 swine influenza epidemic, as questions swirl around whether the UN agency exaggerated the importance of H1N1. The WHO will prepare an interim version of its review of the global H1N1 response in time for the next World Health Assembly in May.