Pandemic WMA Statement INB10 2024

WORLD MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
ASSOCIATION MEDICALE MONDIALE
ASOCIACION MEDICA MUNDIAL
Centre International de Bureaux FEIN : 13-2566243
Immeuble A “Keynes” Website : www.wma.net Postal Address :
13, chemin du Levant Telephone : (33) 4 50 40 75 75 Boîte Postale 63
01210 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE Fax : (33) 4 50 40 59 37 01210 FERNEY-VOLTAIRE Cedex
France E-mail address : wma@wma.net France
10th
Intergovernmental Negotiating Body
July 2024
Item 3: Consideration of, and Agreement on, Proposed Workplan, Meeting Schedule and
Updates, as Appropriate, to the Method of Work
Thank you chair,
The members of the WMA span across all regions of the world.
We have, unfortunately, witnessed firsthand the devastatingly inequitable impact of the pandemic.
We have lost colleagues in parts of the world where there was inadequate access to PPE or where
healthcare workers could not access necessary countermeasures including vaccines in a timely
manner.
These stories are some of what is driving our desire to further contribute and are at the origin of the
start of these negotiations.
Conducting negotiations in closed sessions deprives member states of the benefit of our experience
and technical expertise and our capacity to fully contribute.
We are encouraged to hear a greater openness to have NSA engaged in the room including mentions
of having observers in the room during drafting group meetings.
We also wish to highlight that for effective participation we also need timely access to
documentation.
Greater transparency, the standard mode of operation in many other UN bodies, would allow us to
more effectively combat disinformation circulating around the current negotiations.
This would benefit the process at large.
We are committed to being active partners in further negotiations and the eventual implementation.
Thank you.
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