World Health Assembly adopts historic Pandemic Agreement to make the world more equitable and safer from future pandemics

• Agreement’s adoption follows three years of intensive negotiation launched due to gaps and inequities identified in national and global COVID-19 response.
• Agreement boosts global collaboration to ensure stronger, more equitable response to future pandemics.
• Next steps include negotiations on Pathogen Access and Benefits Sharing system.

Member States of the World Health Organization (WHO) today formally adopted by consensus the world's first Pandemic Agreement. The landmark decision by the 78th World Health Assembly culminates more than three years of intensive negotiations launched by governments in response to the devastating impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, and driven by the goal of making the world safer from – and more equitable in response to – future pandemics.

“The world is safer today thanks to the leadership, collaboration and commitment of our Member States to adopt the historic WHO Pandemic Agreement,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “The Agreement is a victory for public health, science and multilateral action. It will ensure we, collectively, can better protect the world from future pandemic threats. It is also a recognition by the international community that our citizens, societies and economies must not be left vulnerable to again suffer losses like those endured during COVID-19.”  

Governments adopted the WHO Pandemic Agreement today in a plenary session of the World Health Assembly, WHO’s peak decision-making body. The adoption followed yesterday’s approval of the Agreement by vote (124 in favour, 0 objections, 11 abstentions) in Committee by Member State delegations.

“Starting during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, governments from all corners of the world acted with great purpose, dedication and urgency, and in doing so exercising their national sovereignty, to negotiate the historic WHO Pandemic Agreement that has been adopted today,” said Dr Teodoro Herbosa, Secretary of the Philippines Department of Health, and President of this year’s World Health Assembly, who presided over the Agreement’s adoption. “Now that the Agreement has been brought to life, we must all act with the same urgency to implement its critical elements, including systems to ensure equitable access to life-saving pandemic-related health products. As COVID was a once-in-a-lifetime emergency, the WHO Pandemic Agreement offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to build on lessons learned from that crisis and ensure people worldwide are better protected if a future pandemic emerges.”

The WHO Pandemic Agreement sets out the principles, approaches and tools for better international coordination across a range of areas, in order to strengthen the global health architecture for pandemic prevention, preparedness and response. This includes through the equitable and timely access to vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics.

Regarding national sovereignty, the Agreement states that: “Nothing in the WHO Pandemic Agreement shall be interpreted as providing the Secretariat of the World Health Organization, including the Director-General of the World Health Organization, any authority to direct, order, alter or otherwise prescribe the national and/or domestic law, as appropriate, or policies of any Party, or to mandate or otherwise impose any requirements that Parties take specific actions, such as ban or accept travellers, impose vaccination mandates or therapeutic or diagnostic measures or implement lockdowns.”

Today, the members of the World Health Organization (WHO) adopted a new Pandemic Agreement while setting out the process to finalise negotiations of an Annex to the Agreement on Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing. The Pandemic Agreement contains legally binding rules addressing the gaps in the global ability to face and tackle health emergencies as revealed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Together with the amended International Health Regulations, the Pandemic Agreement will strengthen the capacity of countries to prevent and prepare for pandemics with the comprehensive ‘One Health' approach, which recognises the interdependence between human, animal and plant health and their shared environments. The agreement will also enable equitable access to vaccines and other medical countermeasures, fostering technology transfers on voluntary and mutually agreed terms and supporting capacity building in countries in need, in full respect of the health policy competencies and responsibilities of individual EU Member States. Its implementation would also allow for a better coordination and a more effective mobilisation of financing efforts. These improvements echo and reinforce the EU Global Health Strategy.

Olivér Várhelyi, Commissioner for Health and Animal Welfare, said: “A Pandemic Agreement is a decisive step towards a more effective and cooperative global approach to preventing and managing future pandemics, in full respect of the health policy responsibilities and competences of individual EU Member States. It underscores the continued strength of international cooperation and solidarity. The EU will remain at the forefront of global health to protect our citizens and safeguard the prosperity and stability of our societies.”