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STORY: WHO / HEALTH EMERGENCIES PRESSER
TRT: 5:29
SOURCE: WHO
RESTRICTIONS: PLEASE CREDIT WHO ON SCREEN
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 12 NOVEMBER 2025, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1.Wide shot, press briefing room
2.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“One month since the ceasefire in Gaza was announced, WHO is continuing to support the reconstruction of Gaza’s health system, and the medical evacuation of patients who need treatment outside Gaza. Over the past two years, WHO has supported the evacuation of almost 8000 patients, including more than 5500 children.”
3.Wide shot, press briefing room
4.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“Since WHO took over coordinating medical evacuations in May 2024, we have supported 119 medevac missions, including one today. I am heartened by the commitment shown by countries to provide urgent care to these patients.”
5. Wide shot, press briefing room
6.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“However, more than 16,500 people, including almost 4000 children, are still awaiting evacuation, and more than 900 people have died while waiting for evacuation.”
7. Wide shot, press briefing room
8.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“I thank the 30 countries who have accepted patients for care, but we ask more countries to receive more patients. We also call for the opening of all evacuation routes, particularly to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.”
9. Wide shot, press briefing room
10.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“Today, WHO is publishing this years’ Global Tuberculosis Report, which shows a decline in new TB cases and deaths for the first time since before the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, the number of people being tested and treated is increasing, and research is advancing.”
11. Wide shot, press briefing room
12.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“For the first time in over a century, new, effective TB vaccines for adolescents and adults are within reach. At least 18 vaccine candidates are currently in clinical development, including six in phase three trials.”
13. Wide shot, press briefing room
14.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“Despite all this good news, progress is not victory. TB still killed more than 1.2 million people in 2024, which for a disease that is preventable and curable is simply unconscionable.”
15. Wide shot, press briefing room
16.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“In addition, funding cuts to international aid in many low and middle income countries threaten to reverse the hard-won gains we see in today’s report.”
17. Wide shot, press briefing room
18. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tereza Kasaeva, Department for HIV, Tuberculosis, Hepatitis and Sexually transmitted infections, WHO:
“TB response was managed for many years in the situation of the chronic underfunding, and further cuts could be really catastrophic for TB response and can lead to the increase in mortality.”
19. Wide shot, press briefing room
20. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tereza Kasaeva, Department for HIV, Tuberculosis, Hepatitis and Sexually transmitted infections, WHO:
“Very good examples, in more than 100 countries that managed to decrease TB incidence at least by 20%, and more than 65 countries decreased TB mortality by 35%. It highlights that progress is possible from the century-old disease. It can become a successful story.”
21. Wide shot, press briefing room
22.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“One of the top five drivers of the TB epidemic is tobacco use. People who smoke are twice as likely to develop TB disease. So to fight TB, we must fight tobacco.”
23. Wide shot, press briefing room
24.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“The use of nicotine products such as e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches has expanded rapidly due to aggressive marketing, with bright packaging, sweet flavours, social media influencers, and false claims of “harm reduction”.
25. Wide shot, press briefing room
26.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“Let’s be clear: the companies that make these products are not motivated by harm reduction or health. They are motivated by one thing and one thing only: generating profit for their shareholders.”
27. Wide shot, press briefing room
28.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“Although e-cigarettes are often promoted as safer alternatives to conventional tobacco products, there is no evidence of their net benefit for public health, but mounting evidence of their harm.”
29. Wide shot, press briefing room
30.SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General:
“WHO recommends that all countries regulate nicotine pouches, e-cigarettes, heated tobacco products and smokeless tobacco at least as strongly as they regulate conventional tobacco products.”
31. Wide shot, press briefing room
32. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Benn McGrady, Unit Head, Public Health Law and Policies, Health Promotion Department, WHO:
“What's the industry doing? It's lobbying like crazy at present around its so-called harm reduction agenda. And the industry is particularly focused on trying to sow division and to sow a narrative that these new categories of products are reduced harm products. But the reality of the situation is that these products are being marketed as consumer products to the world at large.”
33. Wide shot, press briefing room
34. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr Benn McGrady, Unit Head, Public Health Law and Policies, Health Promotion Department, WHO:
“They have sweet flavours, they have bright colours, they have characteristics that are specifically attractive to children and young people. This is not public health harm reduction. This is uncontrolled. This is not pursuing a public health agenda. And this is not monitored with public health goals in mind.”
35. Wide shot, press briefing room
WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that one month since the ceasefire in Gaza was announced, WHO is continuing to support the reconstruction of Gaza’s health system, and the medical evacuation of patients who need treatment outside Gaza.
Tedros spoke to reporters today (12 Nov) in Geneva, he noted that over the past two years, WHO has supported the evacuation of almost 8000 patients, including more than 5500 children in Gaza.
Tedros said, “Since WHO took over coordinating medical evacuations in May 2024, we have supported 119 medevac missions, including one today.”
“I am heartened by the commitment shown by countries to provide urgent care to these patients,” the Director-General added.
He also noted, “However, more than 16,500 people, including almost 4000 children, are still awaiting evacuation, and more than 900 people have died while waiting for evacuation.”
The WHO Director-General thanked the 30 countries who have accepted patients for care, but “we ask more countries to receive more patients. We also call for the opening of all evacuation routes, particularly to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem,” he said.
On WHO’s new Global Tuberculosis Report published today, Tedros said it shows “a decline in new TB cases and deaths for the first time since before the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, the number of people being tested and treated is increasing, and research is advancing.”
The Director-General said, “For the first time in over a century, new, effective TB vaccines for adolescents and adults are within reach. At least 18 vaccine candidates are currently in clinical development, including six in phase three trials.”
“Despite all this good news, progress is not victory. TB still killed more than 1.2 million people in 2024, which for a disease that is preventable and curable is simply unconscionable,” Tedros added.
On funding cuts, the WHO chief said, “funding cuts to international aid in many low- and middle-income countries threaten to reverse the hard-won gains we see in today’s report.”
WHO’s Dr Tereza Kasaeva from Department for HIV, Tuberculosis, Hepatitis and Sexually transmitted infections said, “TB response was managed for many years in the situation of the chronic underfunding, and further cuts could be really catastrophic for TB response and can lead to the increase in mortality.”
Kasaeva also said, “Very good examples, in more than 100 countries that managed to decrease TB incidence at least by 20 percent, and more than 65 countries decreased TB mortality by 35 percent. It highlights that progress is possible from the century-old disease. It can become a successful story.”
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said, “One of the top five drivers of the TB epidemic is tobacco use. People who smoke are twice as likely to develop TB disease. So to fight TB, we must fight tobacco.”
He also said, “The use of nicotine products such as e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches has expanded rapidly due to aggressive marketing, with bright packaging, sweet flavours, social media influencers, and false claims of “harm reduction”.
“Let’s be clear: the companies that make these products are not motivated by harm reduction or health. They are motivated by one thing and one thing only: generating profit for their shareholders,” the WHO chief reiterated.
Tedros added, “Although e-cigarettes are often promoted as safer alternatives to conventional tobacco products, there is no evidence of their net benefit for public health, but mounting evidence of their harm.”
“WHO recommends that all countries regulate nicotine pouches, e-cigarettes, heated tobacco products and smokeless tobacco at least as strongly as they regulate conventional tobacco products,” he said.
WHO’s Dr Benn McGrady also spoke to reporters. He said, “What's the industry doing? It's lobbying like crazy at present around its so-called harm reduction agenda. And the industry is particularly focused on trying to sow division and to sow a narrative that these new categories of products are reduced harm products. But the reality of the situation is that these products are being marketed as consumer products to the world at large.”
McGrady said, “They have sweet flavours, they have bright colours, they have characteristics that are specifically attractive to children and young people.”
“This is not public health harm reduction. This is uncontrolled. This is not pursuing a public health agenda. And this is not monitored with public health goals in mind,” he concluded.
