The UN yesterday announced it is increasing its appeal to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in fragile and vulnerable countries from US$2 billion to US$6.7 billion.
UN Undersecretary-General and Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock reiterated that the peak of the pandemic is not expected to hit the world’s poorest countries for three to six months.
However, there is already evidence of incomes plummeting and jobs disappearing, food supplies falling and prices soaring, and children missing vaccinations and meals, he said.
Photo: AFP
Since the original appeal on March 25, the UN said US$1 billion has been raised to support efforts across 37 fragile countries to tackle COVID-19.
The updated appeal launched includes nine additional vulnerable countries: Benin, Djibouti, Liberia, Mozambique, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sierra Leone, Togo and Zimbabwe.
“In the poorest countries we can already see economies contracting as export earnings, remittances and tourism disappear,” Lowcock said.
“Unless we take action now, we should be prepared for a significant rise in conflict, hunger and poverty. The specter of multiple famines looms,” he added.
World Food Programme Executive Director David Beasley said the UN agency helps nearly 100 million people on any given day and “unless we can keep those essential operations going, the health pandemic will soon be followed by a hunger pandemic.”
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the caseload in most of the developing countries targeted for assistance in the UN appeal “may seem small, but we know that the surveillance, laboratory testing and health systems’ capacity in these countries are weak.”
“It is therefore likely that there is undetected community transmission happening,” he said.
UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said the impact of the pandemic on people who fled wars and persecution “has been devastating.”
He said the needs of refugees, people displaced in their own countries, stateless people and their hosts “are vast, but not insurmountable.”
“Only collective action to curb the threat of the coronavirus can save lives,” Grandi said.
Lowcock said the COVID-19 pandemic “is unlike anything we have dealt with in our lifetime.”
“Extraordinary measures are needed,” Lowcock said.
“As we come together to combat this virus, I urge donors to act in both solidarity and in self-interest, and make their response proportionate to the scale of the problem we face,” he added.
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