U.S. to Leave World Health Organization Under Trump's Directive"

U.S. to Leave World Health Organization Under Trump's Directive"

On Monday, his first day back in the White House, President Donald Trump made a major announcement that attracted outrage from public health experts: he is pulling the United States out of the World Health Organization.Trump has long been critical of the WHO, and in July 2020, as the Covid-19 outbreak grew, his administration officially started to withdraw from the WHO.

However, one of the first things that then-President Joe Biden did after assuming office was to stop the United States from leaving the organization that oversees the global response to health crises four years ago.

The US withdrawal is justified by the "organization's mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic that arose out of Wuhan, China, and other global health crises, its failure to adopt urgently needed reforms, and its inability to demonstrate independence from the inappropriate political influence of WHO member states," according to the executive order text released on Monday. As he started signing the executive order, Trump said to an assistant, "That's a big one." He cited his 2020 ruling and his opinion that the US was overpaying the group in comparison to other nations. In 2020, Trump also repeatedly charged the group with helping China conceal the origins of COVID-19 and facilitate its proliferation

Amid a once-in-a-century worldwide pandemic, many politicians condemned Trump's decision to withdraw, even though members from both parties had blasted the WHO in 2020 when he initially made the decision. At the time, Nancy Pelosi, the House Speaker, described it as "an act of true senselessness." Moreover, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee's then-chairman, now-retired Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, expressed his disapproval of Trump's choice. During the Biden administration, Dr. Ashish Jha, the White House Covid-19 response coordinator, referred to Trump's choice to leave the WHO during his second term as a "strategic error." According to Jha, "WHO is a pretty essential organization — and with America's withdrawal, it creates a political vacuum that only one country can fill — and that is China."

In the event that the US stops providing financing and leadership for the organization, he said, China will take over, which may "give China more political influence around the world." Lawrence Gostin, a Georgetown University professor of public health law, wrote on X that Trump's decision to leave the WHO is "the most momentous of all" of his unilateral moves on Monday. A catastrophic presidential decision has been made. The US is even more hurt by withdrawal than the rest of the world, he continued. Jha cautioned that the WHO depends largely on US personnel and knowledge, especially when it comes to monitoring influenza worldwide, thus leaving the agency will make it weaker.

The secretary of state and the head of the Office of Management and Budget are urged by Trump's executive action to "pause the future transfer of any United States Government funds, support, or resources" for the WHO. However, the US is required to continue financing the body for a year, and it takes a year to completely withdraw from it. "However, who will uphold the duty? Will Donald Trump be intimidated by international standards regarding these matters? Jha inquired. In a subsequent article, Gostin, who is also Georgetown Law's O'Neill Chair in Global Health Law, claimed that the action is "riddled with legal & factual errors." "Trump will not wait the year that Congress demanded. He is dismantling US funding and involvement.