Deadly outbreaks like the Ebola epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo show the urgent need to complete an international pandemic agreement, the head of the World Health Organization said on Monday, as the ninth round of talks towards finalising the deal opened in Geneva.
Source: AFP via Prima News
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called on countries to "finish the job". "A pathogen threat anywhere can become a threat everywhere, to people of every country," he said, according to a written version of his statement. "The outbreak of hantavirus earlier this year, and the ongoing Ebola epidemic in DRC remind us of this threat." The hantavirus outbreak killed three people on a cruise ship in April, and the latest Ebola outbreak, declared in May, has killed nearly 5,000 people out of more than 10,000 infected, mostly in the DRC, AFP reported.
Source: AFP via Prima News
The one piece still missing
When countries agreed the Pandemic Agreement in May 2025 as a framework for handling future Covid-like pandemics, they left out the mechanism that decides how it works in practice in order to get the deal over the line. That mechanism — the Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing system, or PABS — covers how access to pathogens with pandemic potential is shared, and how the benefits derived from them, such as vaccines, tests and treatments, are shared in return.
Source: AFP via Prima News
"PABS is the last remaining piece of our puzzle," Tedros said, adding that completing it was "the key that will unlock the door to a safer future" and that finishing the treaty was "about protecting people". Wealthy countries and developing nations remain at loggerheads over how the system should operate, AFP reported.
Source: AFP via Prima News
What happens in Geneva now
The WHO says the ninth session of the Intergovernmental Working Group on the Pandemic Agreement runs in hybrid format from November 2 to 13 in Geneva, with drafting and negotiating the PABS annex as its priority task. The outcome of the negotiations is due to be submitted to the Eightieth World Health Assembly in May 2027.
Source: World Health Organization
For readers in Punjab and the diaspora, the stakes are practical: PABS decides whether countries that quickly share virus samples and data are guaranteed fair access to the vaccines and medicines developed from them — the argument that dominated the Covid years.