The United Nations Foundation is a charitable organization headquartered in Washington,DC,that supports the United Nations and its activities. It was established in 1998 with a $1 billion gift to the United Nations by philanthropist Ted Turner,who believed the UN was crucial for addressing the world's problems. Originally primarily a grantmaker,the UN Foundation has evolved into a strategic partner to the UN,mobilizing support to advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),and help the UN address issues such as climate change,global health,gender equality,human rights,data and technology,peace,and humanitarian responses. The UN Foundation's main work occurs through building public-private partnerships,communities,initiatives,campaigns,and alliances to broaden support for the UN and solve global problems. The UN Foundation has helped build awareness and advocate for action on,among others,antimicrobial resistance,regional action on climate change,local implementation of the SDGs,as well as global campaigns such as Nothing But Nets against malaria,the Measles &Rubella Initiative,the Clean Cooking Alliance,Girl Up,Shot@Life,and the Digital Impact Alliance,among others. In March 2020,the UN Foundation was also a key founder of the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund on behalf of the World Health Organization (WHO),helping to raise over $200 million USD within the first six weeks to support the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mark Andrew Green is an American politician and diplomat who is the president,director and CEO of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Before joining the Wilson Center on March 15,2021,he served as the executive director of the McCain Institute for International Leadership,and prior to that,as the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development. He served in the Wisconsin State Assembly from 1993 to 1999,was a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives from 1999 to 2007,representing Wisconsin's 8th congressional district,ran unsuccessfully for governor of Wisconsin in 2006,and held the post of United States Ambassador to Tanzania from August 2007 until January 2009. Green served as president of the International Republican Institute from 2014 to 2017 and sits on the board of directors of the Millennium Challenge Corporation.
Thomas Reeve "Tom" Pickering is a retired United States ambassador. Among his many diplomatic appointments,he served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 1989 to 1992.
Jan Kenneth Eliasson is a Swedish diplomat who was Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations from July 2012 to December 2016. A member of the Swedish Social Democratic Party,Eliasson served as Minister for Foreign Affairs from 24 April to 6 October 2006. Eliasson was appointed as Governing Board Chair of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in April 2017 and assumed his role as of 1 June 2017.
Stewart Simonson is the Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organization responsible for the WHO Office at the United Nations and the WHO-US Liaison Office. He also serves as the Director-General's Special Representative for UN Reform. Prior to his assignment in New York,Simonson was the Assistant Director-General for the General Management Group at WHO headquarters in Geneva,Switzerland.
An influenza pandemic is an epidemic of an influenza virus that spreads across a large region and infects a large proportion of the population. There have been six major influenza epidemics in the last 140 years,with the 1918 flu pandemic being the most severe;this is estimated to have been responsible for the deaths of 50–100 million people. The most recent,the 2009 swine flu pandemic,resulted in under 300,000 deaths and is considered relatively mild. These pandemics occur irregularly.
President George W. Bush announced the International Partnership on Avian and Pandemic Influenza in his remarks to the High-Level Plenary Meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on September 14,2005,in New York. On September 15,2005,Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Dr. Paula Dobriansky was joined by the Director General of the World Health Organization Dr. Lee Jong-wook,Executive Director of UNICEF Ann Veneman,and senior representatives from several participating countries to describe the Partnerships goals of improving global readiness by:
The Global Health Security Initiative (GHSI) is an informal international partnership among countries in order to exchange information and coordinate practices for confronting new threats and risks to global health. It was formed to respond to threats of biological,chemical,or radio-nuclear terrorism (CBRN),with pandemic influenza added to the scope a year later.
GISAID is a global science initiative and primary source established in 2008 that provides open access to genomic data of influenza viruses and the coronavirus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. On January 10,2020,the first whole-genome sequences of SARS-CoV-2 were made available on GISAID,which enabled global responses to the pandemic,including the development of the first vaccines and diagnostic tests to detect SARS-CoV-2. The database has become the world's largest repository for SARS-CoV-2 sequences. GISAID facilitates genomic epidemiology and real-time surveillance to monitor the emergence of new COVID-19 viral strains across the planet.
Henrietta Holsman Fore is an American public health and international development executive who served as the 7th executive director of UNICEF till January 2022. Fore currently serves as chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Holsman International,a manufacturing and investment company. She served in three presidential appointments under President George W. Bush:Fore was the first woman Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance,the 11th Under Secretary of Management in the Department of State,and the 37th Director of the United States Mint in the U.S. Department of Treasury. She was the presidential appointee for President George H. W. Bush at the United States Agency for International Development.
Joxel García is a Puerto Rican physician and a retired four-star admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. He served as the fourteenth Assistant Secretary for Health (ASH),U.S. Department of Health and Human Services from March 13,2008,to January 20,2009. He served as the Director of Health in the District of Columbia. He served as the Executive Director of the MD Anderson Cancer Control and Prevention Platform and Member of the Leadership Team of the MD Anderson Moon Shots program until May 2017 before joining American Express as Vice President and Chief Medical Officer.
Leonard J. Marcus is an American social scientist and administrator. He is director of the Program for Health Care Negotiation and Conflict Resolution at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard University,and founding co-director of the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative,a joint program of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) is a center within the University of Minnesota that focuses on addressing public health preparedness and emerging infectious disease response. It was founded in 2001 by Dr. Michael Osterholm,in order to "prevent illness and death from infectious diseases through epidemiological research and rapid translation of scientific information into real-world practical applications and solutions".
Robert Geers Loftis is a career member of the United States Foreign Service,former United States Ambassador to the Kingdom of Lesotho,and former Acting Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization at the United States Department of State.
Ali S. Khan is an American practicing physician and former Director of the Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response (PHPR) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Since July 2014,he has served as Dean of the College of Public Health and Retired Assistant Surgeon General at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha,Nebraska.
The Mekong Basin Disease Surveillance (MBDS) consortium is a self-organised and sub-regional co-operation spearheaded by health ministries from member countries to collaborate on infectious disease surveillance and control. The co-operation focuses on cross-border co-operation at selected sites and has matured through several phases of work. PRO/MBDS is a component of the outbreak reporting system ProMED-mail.
African-Americans in foreign policy in the United States catalogs distinguished African Americans who have and continue to contribute to international development,diplomacy,and defense through their work with the U.S. Department of State,the U.S. Agency for International Development,the U.S. Information Agency,and the U.S. Congress,and other notable agencies and non-governmental organizations. The creators acknowledge the presence of the interagency contributions to the foreign affairs realm,and welcome additional content to showcase the achievements of African-Americans in other relevant USG agencies.
Sir Jeremy James Farrar is a British medical researcher and director of the Wellcome Trust since 2013. He was previously a professor of tropical medicine at the University of Oxford.
Juan JoséGómez Camacho is a Mexican diplomat. Ambassador Juan JoséGómez-Camacho was appointed as Permanent Representative of Mexico to the United Nations in New York in February 2016. From 2019 to 2022 he served as Mexican ambassador to Canada.
Ilaria Capua is an Italian virologist and former politician,best known for her research on influenza viruses,particularly avian influenza,and her efforts promoting open access to genetic information on emerging viruses as part of pre-pandemic preparedness efforts.
