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LONDON — The United States officially left the World Health Organization on Thursday, Jan. 22, after a year of warning that doing so would harm public health in the United States and globally, saying the decision reflected the U.N. health agency’s failure to manage the COVID-19 pandemic.
President Donald Trump announced through an executive order that the United States would withdraw from the organization on his first day in office in 2025. A news release from the U.S. Departments of Health and State said the U.S. will only work with the WHO in a limited capacity to effectuate the withdrawal.
A senior government health official said, “We have no plans to participate as an observer, and we have no plans to participate again.” The United States said it plans to work directly with other countries on disease surveillance and other public health priorities rather than through international organizations.
Disputes over feed paid for by the United States
Under U.S. law, they were required to give one year’s notice and pay all outstanding fees (approximately $260 million) before departing. But U.S. State Department officials objected, saying the law included a condition requiring payments to be made before withdrawal.
“Americans have paid more than enough,” a State Department spokesperson said in an email early Thursday.
The Department of Health and Human Services announced in a document released Thursday that the government has ended funding for the department. An HHS spokesperson said President Trump exercised his authority to suspend future transfers of U.S. government resources to the WHO because it has cost the United States trillions of dollars.
The U.S. flag was being removed from outside the WHO headquarters in Geneva on Thursday, witnesses said. In recent weeks, the United States has moved to withdraw from many other U.N. bodies, and some worry that President Trump’s recently launched peace commission could weaken the entire U.N.
Some critics of the WHO have also proposed creating a new agency to replace the organization, but a proposal reviewed by the Trump administration last year suggested instead a U.S. push for reform and U.S. leadership at the organization.
unlikely to return soon
Over the past year, a number of global health experts have urged a rethink, including most recently WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
The WHO also said the United States has not yet paid its dues in 2024 and 2025. Member states will discuss the US withdrawal and its handling at the WHO executive board meeting in February, a WHO spokesperson said.
“This is a clear violation of U.S. law,” said Lawrence Gostin, founding director of Georgetown University’s O’Neill Institute for Global Health Law in Washington, who has been closely following the WHO. “But Mr. Trump is likely to avoid this issue.”
Bill Gates, chairman of the Gates Foundation, a major funder of the Global Health Initiative and some of the WHO’s work, told Reuters in Davos that he did not expect the United States to reconsider in the short term.
Gates said he continues to support rejoining the United States. “The world needs the World Health Organization,” he said.
What departure means
The U.S. withdrawal triggered a financial crisis, and the WHO cut its executive team in half, scaled back its operations, and slashed the agency’s budget. Washington has traditionally been the UN health agency’s largest financial supporter, contributing about 18% of all funding. The WHO also plans to cut about a quarter of its staff by the middle of this year.
The agency said it had been cooperating and sharing information with the United States over the last year. It’s unclear how this partnership will work going forward.
Global health experts said this poses a risk to the United States, the WHO and the world.
“The U.S. withdrawal from the WHO could weaken the systems and collaborations the world relies on to detect, prevent, and respond to health threats,” said Kelly Henning, public health program director at the U.S.-based nonprofit Bloomberg Philanthropies.
(Reporting by Jennifer Rigby and Emma Farge; Additional reporting by Jeffrey Dustin in Davos and Michael Ehrman in New York; Editing by David Gregorio and Bill Berkrot)
