Russia seeks access to safe, efficacious COVID-19 medicines

Russian Deputy Health Minister Alexandra Dronova said on Monday that it was necessary to get rid of all obstacles to access to safe and efficacious medicines in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Dronova said this at a session of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Moscow. “In order to prevent and contain the infections … we stress the importance of timely and equitable access to safe, quality and efficacious medicine which is necessary to combat COVID-19. ‘`We must get rid of all obstacles to access to these medicines and we recognise the key role of the WHO as the coordinator,” Dronova said. She added that Russia highly appreciates the WHO comprehensive response to the pandemic, adding that the organisation took timely measures in that regard. Global COVID-19 cases surpassed 35 million on Sunday, according to the Centre for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University. The global case count reached 35,008,447 with a total of 1,034,818 deaths worldwide as of 3:23 p.m. local time (1923 GMT), the CSSE data showed. The U.S. reported the most cases and deaths, which stood at 7,411,716 and 209,720, respectively.