May 29, 2020

expert reaction to Donald Trump saying the US will be terminating its relationship with the World Health Organisation and directing funds towards other global public health charities

In a speech*, the US President Donald Trump said that the US will be terminating its relationship with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and directing funds towards other global public health charities

Dr Adam Kamradt-Scott, Senior Lecturer in International Security Studies, University of Sydney, said:

“As the former Soviet Union once discovered, there is normally no means within the World Health Organization’s constitution for members to withdraw from the intergovernmental organization.  The one exception to this is that the United States did lodge a reservation when it first joined the WHO in 1948, stating it reserved the right to withdraw, but under the terms of that reservation it requires one year’s notice and cannot be affected within a 30-day period as outlined by President Trump.

“This is distinct from the moral argument in which the United States has now confirmed it is stepping down from international leadership role it has played on global health.  The reputational damage from this announcement, even it cannot be carried out, will likely last long after President Trump’s term of office.  Indeed, given that there is an election scheduled for November after which this decision may well be reversed by a new President, the threat from President Trump should be seen for what it is: a blatant attempt to distract the international community and the United States’ domestic population from the fact he has fundamentally failed to contain the pandemic in the country he is responsible for.  The pandemic in the US has resulted in the deaths of more than 100,000 of his citizens.”

Dr Gail Carson, Director of Network Development at ISARIC (International Severe Acute Respiratory and Emerging Infection Consortium), and Consultant in Infectious Diseases, University of Oxford, said:

“If there was a time not to make health political it is now, when the world is in the throws of a pandemic.  Now is the time for solidarity and to stand together to end the pandemic as soon as we can and to save lives.  As I wrote back in March when President Trump suspended the US funds to WHO, President T. Roosevelt (another Republican) said in 1903: “The welfare of us is dependent fundamentally upon the welfare of all of us, and therefore in public life that man is best representative of each of us who seeks to do good to each by doing good to all”.

“Is this US Government decision going to do good to all?  WHO stands for the health of all of us and should not be ‘punished’ by any country in the middle of a pandemic because of an opinion, certainly not before any action review process has taken place.  Now is not the time to weaken the world’s leading health agency who has shown strong leadership with strong technical messages throughout this pandemic.”

Dr Stephen Griffin, Associate Professor in the School of Medicine, University of Leeds, said:

“There is no logic to the move by President Trump to sever links with the WHO.  Pandemics are, by definition, a global crisis.  To not face COVID19 with a united front seems futile.  Given the scale of the outbreak in the US, this action appears nothing short of an attempt to refocus attention away from how this has been handled.”

* https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-52857413

All our previous output on this subject can be seen at this weblink:

www.sciencemediacentre.org/tag/covid-19

Declared interests

None received.