Medical oxygen is a life-saving medicine that is used to treat many conditions throughout the care continuum. Despite the clinical importance of medical oxygen and inclusion on the WHO Essential Medicines List, it remains a hard to access resource in health care settings.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted inequities in availability and access to this life-saving medicine and the inherent challenges in the process of generation, distribution, and delivery of oxygen to patients.
The WHO Access to Oxygen Initiative provides technical and operational support to Member States. This includes identifying and implementing holistic solutions to enable a resilient oxygen ecosystem.
A suite of online tools support decisions and maintenance of these oxygen systems, and can be found here: Oxygen tools. These web-based applications are also independently accessible, allowing users to: estimate ongoing energy costs, and total cost of ownership; convert units of oxygen; assess oxygen plant component performance (booster compressor); plan preventative maintenance. The user can easily download the results for offline use, and no information or data are stored by the apps. Individual tools can be found here:
Quantifying oxygen needs-gap at the facility level
Estimating electrical operational costs of an on-site oxygen generation system
Conversion and equivalence of common metrics / units used when measuring oxygen volume
Oxygen
Clinical management of COVID-19
WHO Respiratory Support Research
Health Care Readiness
Foundations of medical oxygen systems
17 February 2023
Foundations of medical oxygen systemsRead More
Foundations of medical oxygen systems has been complied to capture definitions, technical requirements, tools and resources related to medical oxygen systems based on information available in January 2023. This publication aims to make relevant and practical material accessible for Member States, policy makers, implementing partners, practitioners, biomedical engineers and technicians.
Key performance indicators for medical oxygen systems
17 February 2023
Developing key performance indicators for the medical oxygen ecosystem through Delphi...The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of and inequities in access to life-saving medical oxygen. However, no consolidated list of Key Performance...
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The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of and inequities in access to life-saving medical oxygen. However, no consolidated list of Key Performance Indicators (KPI) exist to date to monitor these investments.
WHO lead a study to define the KPIs for monitoring global investments in medical oxygen.
These indicators can be used at global and national levels to measure performance and identify areas for improvement within the global medical oxygen response. This report summarizes the outcome of the survey and discusses next steps for the operationalization of the KPIs.
Operational guidance
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5 February 2025
National medical oxygen scale-up plan: Development guidanceIn line with WHA resolution 76.3 Increasing access to medical oxygen, WHO, Member States and partners, co-developed a guidance to strengthen the medical...
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31 December 2024
WHO Technical specifications for health facility based medical oxygen systemsThe Clinical Management and Operations Unit (Country Readiness Strengthening Department) in collaboration with the Medical Devices and Diagnostics Unit...
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10 December 2024
National oxygen scale-up framework: road to oxygen access: meeting report, Dakar, Senegal, 14–16 May...The World Health Organization (WHO) convened a meeting in Dakar, Senegal, from May 14 to 16, 2024 to produce a template for developing evidence-based,...
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8 March 2024
Summary of WHO symposium on meeting the global needs for oxygen and respiratory careGlobal access to oxygen and options to deliver respiratory support are limited, and patient needs in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are unmet....
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Tools and resources for health care workers
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27 June 2024
National Oxygen Scale-Up Framework Meeting: Road to Oxygen Access- BrochureRead More
22 June 2023
Statement on access to quality and safe medical oxygenIt is estimated that fewer than half of all health facilities in low- and middle-income countries haveuninterrupted access to medical oxygen, contributing...
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14 November 2022
TRS 1044 - Annex 5: WHO good manufacturing practices for medicinal gasesArising from an increased demand for medicinal gases, in particular theuse of oxygen in the treatment of patients with coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19),...
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29 April 2021
Oxygen Cylinder SafetyThis poster is intended for health workers and other personnel on the safety and mitigation measures that need to be adhered to when dealing with medical...
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Operational updates
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25 February 2025
WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies - January 2025WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies, published monthly, highlights WHO’s work on preparedness and emergency response, combating health...
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10 February 2025
WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies - December 2024WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies, published monthly, highlights WHO’s work on preparedness and emergency response, combating health...
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30 November 2024
WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies - November 2024WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies, published monthly, highlights WHO’s work on preparedness and emergency response, combating health...
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14 November 2024
WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies - October 2024WHO's Operational Update on Health Emergencies, published monthly, highlights WHO’s work on preparedness and emergency response, combating health...
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Oxygen regulations and standards
WHO good manufacturing practices for medicinal gases
Events
News
Other resources
