Global Summit to End COVID-19

A coalition of 80 global leaders and over 25 organizations across corporate, philanthropic, civil society, advocacy, academic, and health sectors have called on world leaders attending the United Nations General Assembly this month to convene a global summit to ignite an urgent global action plan to end the pandemic. The call to action was coordinated by the COVID Collaborative, Duke-Margolis Center for Health Policy, Duke Global Health Innovation Center, Duke Global Health Institute, and the Pandemic Action Network.

SEPTEMBER 1, 2021

A Call for a Global Summit to End the COVID-19 Pandemic


Dear World Leaders Attending the 2021 UN General Assembly:

The world is at a perilous and urgent moment in the COVID-19 pandemic. The Delta variant has spread rapidly to more than 130 countries, demonstrating that we are fighting a virus that doesn’t respect borders and advances rapidly across continents.

The best way to prevent further catastrophe is to dramatically decrease worldwide cases and slow transmission of the virus through widespread global vaccination, combined with other public health measures. However, inequitable access to high-quality vaccines and capacity to administer them is prolonging the pandemic and destabilizing economies and societies around the world.

Therefore, we call on world leaders to convene a global summit during this year’s United Nations General Assembly and commit to actions to make 7 billion doses of high-quality vaccines available before the end of 2021 and an additional 7 billion doses by mid-2022; ensure that every country is ready to implement equitable vaccination programs at scale by the end of this year; and vaccinate 70 percent of the world’s population by mid-2022. People everywhere should also have equitable access to tests, therapies, and other proven interventions so lives can be saved using all COVID-19 tools.

A global pandemic needs a global plan of attack. The summit should secure the commitments and actions needed to close the vaccine supply, financing and capacity gaps. Very soon there will be enough supply of high-quality vaccines to assure that all countries can meet the needs of their own citizens and also engage in a global effort to vaccinate everyone. Urgent actions must be taken to increase countries’ distribution and delivery capabilities, which are poised to become the key constraint in the race between vaccines and variants. That is why we need a comprehensive response to the current crisis, which will also strengthen health systems and preparedness for the next pandemic.

We are in a race against time. Without immediate action, there will be millions more infections and deaths, and new variants could emerge and pierce vaccine immunity. We, the undersigned, urge world leaders to align on a common framework for urgent global action by all governments, and private sector leaders, to end the pandemic – everywhere.

Individuals

Ayoade Alakija

Co-Chair, African Union Africa Vaccine Delivery Alliance Alliance for COVID-19

Emily Bancroft

President, VillageReach

Georges C. Benjamin

Executive Director, American Public Health Association

Donald M. Berwick

President Emeritus and Senior Fellow, Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and former Administrator, US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Simon Bland

CEO, Global Institute for Disease Elimination

Bono

Co-Founder of ONE and lead singer of U2

James Boomgard

President and Chief Executive Officer, DAI

Ana Botín

Executive Chair, Banco Santander, S.A.

Ian Boyd

Professor, University of St Andrews

John Bridgeland

Co-Founder and CEO, COVID Collaborative and former Director, White House Domestic Policy Council

Larry Brilliant

CEO, Pandefense Advisory, and Senior Counselor, Skoll Foundation

Robert Califf

Professor of Cardiology, Duke University School of Medicine, and former Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration

Anthony Costello

Professor of Global Health and Sustainable Development, University College London

Cindy Cox-Roman

Chief Executive Officer, HelpAge USA

Richard Curtis

UN SDG Advocate and Co-Founder of Comic Relief and Project Everyone

Mark Cutifani

Chief Executive, Anglo American Plc

Carlos del Rio

Professor, Emory University School of Medicine; International Secretary, National Academy of Medicine

Polly Dunford

President and Chief Executive Officer, IntraHealth International

Mark Dybul

Professor of Medicine, Georgetown University, and former head of PEPFAR and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria

Warren East

Chief Executive, Rolls-Royce Plc

John Edmunds

Professor, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Gary Edson

President, COVID Collaborative, and former US Deputy National Security Advisor

Kevin Ellis

Chairman and Senior Partner, PwC UK and Middle East

Ezekiel J. Emanuel

Vice Provost for Global Initiatives, Co-Director, Healthcare Transformation Institute, Levy University Professor, Perelman School of Medicine and The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, and former Special Advisor on Health Policy, Office of Management and Budget and National Economic Council

Kate Fall

Senior Advisor, Brunswick Group, and Member of the Lords International Relationship Select Committee

Michael Ferguson

Regis Professor of Life Sciences, University of Dundee

Peter Flavel

CEO Coutts & Co

Julio Frenk

President of the University of Miami and former Secretary of Health of Mexico

William Frist

Former US Senator (R-TN) and former Senate Majority Leader

Monica Gandhi

Professor of Medicine and Associate Division Chief of the Division of HIV, Infectious Diseases, and Global Medicine at UCSF

Earl Gast

President, University Research Co., LLC

Helene Gayle

President and Chief Executive Officer, The Chicago Community Trust

Bruce Gellin

Chief, Global Public Health Strategy, The Rockefeller Foundation

Nikolaj Gilbert

President & CEO, PATH

Amanda Glassman

Executive Vice President, Center for Global Development, CEO of CGD Europe, and Senior Fellow

Karen Goraleski

CEO, American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene

Scott Gottlieb

Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute, and former Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration

Margaret (Peggy) Hamburg

Former Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, and former Foreign Secretary of the National Academy of Medicine

James Harding

Co-Founder and Editor, Tortoise

Peter Harrison

Group Chief Executive, Schroders plc

Andrew Hayward

Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Inclusion Health Research, University College London

Jeremy Hunt

Former UK Foreign Secretary and Health Secretary

Mo Ibrahim

Founder and Chair, Mo Ibrahim Foundation

Philip Jansen

Chief Executive, BT Group

Liz Jarman

Chief Executive Officer, Living Goods

Salim S. Abdool Karim

Director, Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa, and member, African Union’s Commission on Covid-19

Peter Kellner

Journalist, Political Commentator, and former President of YouGov

Jimmy Kolker

Former Assistant Secretary, Global Affairs, US Department Health and Human Services

Pascal Lamy

President of the Paris Peace Forum and former Director-General of the WTO

Jack Leslie

Chairman, Weber Shandwick

Gary Lineker

English former Professional Footballer and Current Sports Broadcaster

Peter Mandelson

Former UK First Secretary of State and EU Trade Commissioner

Stanley A. McChrystal

General, US Army (Retired)

Mark McClellan

Director, Duke-Margolis Center for Health Policy, Duke University, and former Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration

Michael Merson

Wolfgang Joklik Professor of Global Health, Duke Global Health Institute, Duke University

David Miliband

President & CEO, International Rescue Committee

Jamie Bay Nishi

Director, Global Health Technologies Coalition

Michelle Nunn

President and CEO, CARE USA

Christina Pagel

Professor and Director of the Clinical Operational Research Unit, University College London

Björg Pálsdóttir

CEO, Training for Health Equity Network: THEnet

Alan Parker

Chairman, Brunswick Group

Melissa Parker

Professor of Medical Anthropology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Daniel B. Peterson

Executive Director (Interim), Global Alliance for Surgical, Obstetric, Trauma, and Anaesthesia Care

Deenan Pillay

Professor of Virology and Pro-Vice-Provost International, University College London

Guy Poppy

Professor and Associate Vice President, University of Southampton, and former Chief Scientific Adviser to UK Food Standards Agency

Venki Ramakrishnan

Group Leader, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology

Carolyn Reynolds

Co-Founder, Pandemic Action Network

Malcolm Rifkind

Former UK Foreign Secretary and Secretary of State for Defense

Reeta Roy

President and CEO, Mastercard Foundation

Kathleen Sebelius

Former US Secretary of Health and Human Services

Rajiv J. Shah

President, The Rockefeller Foundation

Bobby Shriver

Co-Founder, ONE & (RED)

Rachel Silverman

Policy Fellow, Center for Global Development

Andy Slavitt

Former Senior Adviser to COVID-19 Response Coordinator, and former Acting Administrator, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services

Jes Staley

Group Chief Executive, Barclays

Elizabeth Stokoe

Professor, Loughborough University

Mona Sutphen

Senior Advisor, The Vistria Group

Eloise Todd

Co-Founder, Pandemic Action Network

Krishna Udayakumar

Director, Duke Global Health Innovation Center, Duke University

Marian W. Wentworth

President and CEO, Management Sciences for Health

Michelle A. Williams

Dean of Faculty, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Co-Founder, COVID Collaborative

Prashant Yadav

Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development

Organizations

American Public Health Association

American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene

CARE

Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa

COVID Collaborative

DAI

Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevoelkerung (DSW)

FIND

The Global Alliance for Surgical, Obstetric, Trauma and Anaesthesia Care (G4 Alliance)

Global Citizen

Global Health Technologies Coalition (GHTC)

Global Institute for Disease Elimination

HelpAge USA

IntraHealth International

LivingGoods

Management Sciences for Health (MSH)

Mo Ibrahim Foundation

ONE

Pandemic Action Network

Paris Peace Forum

PATH

Population Services International (PSI)

Sabin Vaccine Institute

Save the Children

THEnet: The Training for Health Equity Network

Tortoise

UCSF Institute for Global Health Sciences

University Research Co. (URC)

White House Global COVID-19 Summit

COVID Collaborative was invited to attend the September 22 Global COVID-19 Summit, hosted by the White House. We were asked to submit a statement outlining COVID Collaborative’s commitment to the Summit targets and the specific actions it will take this fall to end the pandemic and build back better.

READ THE STATEMENT

Press

Experts Call on World Leaders to Commit to a Global Plan of Attack on COVID at Summit

More Than 60 Leading Organizations Across Civil Society, Academia, Philanthropy, Health, and Social Enterprise Define a 6-Point Plan to End the Global COVID-19 Crisis

Pandemic Action Network

How a DGHI Vaccine Database Pushed Policymakers on Global Vaccinations

A Global COVID summit convened by the White House this week might not have happened without some timely Duke research data, made freely available when the world needed it most.

Gregory Phillips

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