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Report: WHO praises Bahrain’s handling of COVID-19 pandemic
A new WHO report showed that Bahrain’s successful response to the COVID-19 pandemic was built on active collaboration between various sectors in the Gulf state.
The document titled “Bahrain COVID-19 Case Studies,” highlights the country’s wide-ranging efforts to get the health crisis under control and identifies lessons learned from that response, the Arabnews reported.
The world health body credits strategic partnerships between public and private entities for the positive response.
The study was presented by Ahmed Al-Mandhari, the health organization’s head for the eastern Mediterranean region.
Al-Mandhari said: “I would like to acknowledge the resilience of the health system in Bahrain throughout the pandemic, and its continued provision of essential health services for all, under a framework of accessibility, acceptability, availability, and quality.”
“This new report provides us with a valuable reminder: Together we can face health emergencies, and together we can build back stronger,” he said in a joint press conference with Jaleela S. Jawad Hasan, the health minister, on Tuesday (July 5).
The report stated that by using its existing health infrastructure, the kingdom “capitalized on and scaled up its existing resources and displayed a level of preparedness and synergy of efforts from both the top down and the bottom up.”
The authors of the report stated that King Hamad’s decision to provide testing and vaccines to the public free of charge was among the positive steps in handling the crisis.
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The report concluded that the lessons learned from what the country has achieved provide “invaluable insights into best practices that, shared, will have far-reaching and long-lasting effects beyond Bahrain’s borders.”
Bahrain detected its first case of the virus on Feb. 24, 2020, and caseloads have remained relatively low during the pandemic, with only short-lived surges as a result of the delta and omicron variants.
The country has lost 1,495 people to the disease since the start of the pandemic, according to the information organization Our World in Data.
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On Tuesday (July 5), the health ministry reported 40 active hospitalized cases, 15 of which were critical.
Bahrain removed most COVID-19 restrictions in February 2022, doing away with capacity limits at indoor venues and testing and vaccination requirements for travelers heading to the kingdom.
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