In the event of a future pandemic, the world should be able to prepare itself within 100 days, the leaders of the seven economically strongest democracies decided at the G7 summit in England.
The "Carbis Bay Declaration", which the leaders are working on during the summit and which is named after the seaside resort in Cornwall where the summit is taking place, is expected to help countries better prepare in the case of another global health crisis.
"This marks a historic moment," British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the host of the G7 summit, said on Twitter.
The #CarbisBayDeclaration marks a proud and historic moment for us all.
Under this agreement, the world's leading democracies will commit to preventing a global pandemic from ever happening again, ensuring the devastation caused by COVID-19 is never repeated. — Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) June 12, 2021
He added that the world's leading democracies are committing to ensuring that "a global pandemic can never happen again so that the havoc caused by COVID-19 is never repeated."
The battle plan includes, for example, shortening the time needed to develop vaccines and treatments, and includes a reform of the World Health Organisation (WHO), but does not mention lifting vaccine patents in order to increase production, which has been a point of contention between the European Parliament and Commission.
