World leaders will join forces in bid to stop any new pandemic within 100 days

World leaders will commit today to work together to crush future pandemics within 100 days.

The G7 nations will sign what will be known as the Carbis Bay Declaration, after the Cornish resort where the summit is being held.

As part of the strategy, Britain will build a £25million animal vaccine centre to halt the spread of new diseases and therefore prevent them from jumping to humans.

The G7 nations – the UK, US, Canada, Japan, France, Germany and Italy – will commit to measures aimed at slashing the time taken to develop and license vaccines, treatments and diagnostics for any future disease to under 100 days

About three-quarters of new human diseases are thought to have started in animals. 

The Animal Vaccine Manufacturing and Innovation Centre at Pirbright in Surrey will be backed by £10million from the Government and £14.5million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The centre will draw on the existing Pirbright Institute’s world-leading expertise in preventing and controlling the spread of viruses in order to accelerate the delivery of vaccines for livestock diseases.

Melinda French Gates, as she is now known after separating from the Microsoft founder, and the UK’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance will present findings from their work on the pandemic preparedness partnership to the G7 leaders today.

The Carbis Bay Declaration will incorporate the recommendations of their findings, which highlight how the first 100 days after the identification of an epidemic threat are crucial to changing its course and preventing it from becoming a pandemic.

The G7 nations – the UK, US, Canada, Japan, France, Germany and Italy – will commit to measures aimed at slashing the time taken to develop and license vaccines, treatments and diagnostics for any future disease to under 100 days.

The Animal Vaccine Manufacturing and Innovation Centre at Pirbright in Surrey will be backed by £10million from the Government and £14.5million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

The G7 nations will sign what will be known as the Carbis Bay Declaration, after the Cornish resort where the summit is being held

They will also promise to reinforce global surveillance networks and support reforming and strengthening the World Health Organisation.

Boris Johnson said last night: ‘To truly defeat coronavirus and recover we need to prevent a pandemic like this from ever happening again. 

‘That means learning lessons from the last 18 months and doing it differently next time around. I am proud that for the first time today the world’s leading democracies have come together to make sure that never again will we be caught unawares.’

Covid is thought to have spread to humans from bats, although some now believe it might have escaped from a laboratory in China.