EU announces €2.2 million emergency funding for WHO to manage India’s covid surge

The European Commission on Wednesday announced that it will allocate an initial €2.2 million in emergency funding to respond to the surge in COVID-19 cases in India.

The funding will support the World Health Organization (WHO) for a 6-month case management of COVID-19 patients, as well as strengthening laboratory capacity for COVID-19 testing.

EU Commissioner for Crisis Management, Janez Lenarčič, said: “We are providing additional EU support towards the fight against COVID-19 in India. This comes on top of the generous and swift assistance from EU Member States that stepped up as part of Team Europe to offer critical supplies of oxygen, ventilators and medicines over the last few days. We stand ready to work with the WHO and other partners on the ground to jointly fight this battle at this difficult time – we are stronger together.”


Member States have already mobilised supplies of urgently needed oxygen, ventilators and medicines from Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Spain and Sweden to India over the last week via the EU Civil Protection Mechanism.

Meanwhile, India’s close partner in East Asia Japan announced additional support to fight surge. “Pleased to share what FM Motegi has just expressed to @DrSJaishankar in London. Japan is ready to provide additional & much-needed items worth up to USD 50 million in India's #FightCOVID,” Japanese Ambassador to India tweeted.