WHO regional director says COVID-19 threat far from over, despite vaccine progress
In a lengthy interview with Al-Monitor, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean Ahmed al-Mandhari warns the coronavirus "remains a cause for concern," as he discussed his organization’s efforts to help the countries of the region cope with the pandemic.
CAIRO — Regional Director of the World Health Organization (WHO) for the Eastern Mediterranean Ahmed al-Mandhari warned that the coronavirus pandemic continues to be a cause for concern, as cases in the eastern Mediterranean region, which includes 22 countries, have topped 3 million, with 78,000 deaths as of early November.
In a Nov. 1 interview with Al-Monitor via WhatsApp, Mandhari said that there are currently around 200 coronavirus vaccine candidates under development, 40 of which have reached the human clinical evaluation stage, and a large number of vaccines are in phase three trials. He noted that several countries in the eastern Mediterranean region are participating in the third phase of vaccine trials.
Below is the full text of the interview.
Al-Monitor: How do you see the epidemiological situation of COVID-19 in the eastern Mediterranean region? Have the region's countries entered the second wave of the virus?
