WHO warning: Pandemic set to be far more deadly this year

GENEVA • The World Health Organisation has issued a grim warning that the Covid-19 pandemic's second year is on track to be its deadliest, as he urged rich countries to donate vaccines rather than give children the jab.

"We're on track for the second year of this pandemic to be far more deadly than the first," WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a press conference on Friday.

He urged rich countries to reconsider plans to vaccinate children and instead donate Covid-19 shots to the Covax scheme for poorer countries.

"I understand why some countries want to vaccinate their children and adolescents, but right now, I urge them to reconsider and to instead donate vaccines to Covax," he said.

The WHO is hoping more countries will follow France and Sweden in donating shots to Covax after inoculating their priority populations to help address a gulf in vaccination rates.

Canada and the United States are among countries that have authorised vaccines for use in adolescents in recent weeks. However, a WHO official said talks with Washington on sharing doses were under way.

Covax, which has delivered around 60 million doses so far, has struggled to meet supply targets partly because of Indian export restrictions on the AstraZeneca vaccine due to its growing epidemic.

So far, around 1.26 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccine have been administered globally.

The pandemic has killed more than 3.3 million people worldwide since the virus first emerged in late 2019, according to an Agence France-Presse tally of official data.

Meanwhile, India has started deploying Russia's Sputnik V corona-virus vaccine, the first foreign-made shot to be used in the country that has been reeling from an explosion of cases and fatalities.

The first token batch of Sputnik vaccines - reportedly 150,000 doses - arrived on May 1 and a second delivery is expected in the next few days.

A number of leading India-based drugmakers have agreements for local production of Sputnik V, with the aim to produce over 850 million doses of the jab per year.

India has been adding roughly as many new Covid-19 cases daily as the rest of the world put together.

More than 260,000 Indians have died, according to official figures.

In Europe, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson warned that the arrival of the B16172 variant, one of those believed to be driving the Indian surge, could delay reopening of society and the economy.

"This new variant could pose a serious disruption to our progress," Mr Johnson said. "We will do whatever it takes to keep the public safe."

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS