President Donald Trump announces US withdrawal from World Health Organisation

A significant move cutting ties with the United Nation's public health agency on his first day in office, the order also said that the WHO "continues to demand unfairly onerous payments" from the US

New York: President Donald Trump announced on Monday that he is withdrawing the US from the World Health Organisation, a significant move cutting ties with the United Nation’s public health agency on his first day in office.

Trump has long been critical of the WHO, and his administration formally withdrew from the organisation in July 2020 as the Covid-19 pandemic continued to spread.

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The text of the executive order cites the “organisation’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,” as reasons for the US withdrawal.

“That’s a big one,” Trump told an aide as he began to sign the executive order, pointing to his 2020 decision and his belief that the US was paying too much money to the organisation compared to other countries. The order also said that the WHO “continues to demand unfairly onerous payments” from the US.

The plan, which aligns with Trump’s longstanding criticism of the UN health agency, would mark a dramatic shift in US global health policy and further isolate Washington from international efforts to battle pandemics.

Trump has nominated several critics of the organisation to top public health positions, including Robert F Kennedy Jr, a vaccine skeptic who is up for the post of secretary of Health and Human Services, which oversees all major US health agencies, including the CDC and FDA.

Trump initiated the year-long withdrawal process from the WHO in 2020 but six months later his successor, President Joe Biden, reversed the decision.