President Piñera highlights the need for an international agreement to address future pandemics at the Ibero-American Summit: “The international health system must be improved so it can provide a global solution”

In his address at the 27th Ibero-American Summit in Andorra this Wednesday, the President of Chile, Sebastián Piñera, highlighted the need for an international agreement to address future pandemics.

“It’s time to start overcoming this political deficit and signing a treaty on preparing for and responding to pandemics constitutes a necessary step in this direction,” said President Piñera, who participated online at the meeting of heads of state and government.

At the event, the President reiterated the need to strengthen the World Health Organization in order to provide a global solution to address future pandemics, which should be coordinated and based on the values of cooperation, solidarity and transparency.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has seriously impacted the whole world, but especially our region, which suffers from weak systems of protection, limited healthcare systems and profound social inequalities,” stated the President.

He added that the economic recovery following the pandemic will provide a great opportunity to address these deficiencies and strengthen social protection systems at the same time as fostering economic reactivation and job creation.

This is the first time that Andorra has hosted the Ibero-American Summit and the agenda centered around innovation for sustainable development and recovery following COVID-19, with a special emphasis on innovations in the health, social, economic and environmental aspects of the recovery.

“This pandemic and the technological revolution are providing us with a great opportunity to build a better, more integrated, caring, inclusive and sustainable world rather than returning to how we were before the pandemic,” said the President.