According to experts, Donald Trump’s transition team is pushing to pull the US out of the World Health Organization on the first day of the new administration.
According to the Financial Times, members of Trump’s team told the experts of their intention to announce a withdrawal from the global health body on the president-elect’s January 20 inauguration.
Potential Implication
The departure of the US would remove the WHO’s biggest source of funds, damaging its ability to respond to public health crises such as the coronavirus pandemic.
Speaking on this, Lawrence Gostin, professor of global health at Georgetown Law said “America is going to leave a huge vacuum in global health financing and leadership. I see no one that is going to fill the breach,” The US is currently the WHO’s largest single donor, providing about 16% of its funding in 2022-23.
Earlier In 2020, Trump had initiated the process to leave the WHO as Covid-19 spread, accusing the agency of being under China’s control but the process was never finished and his successor Joe Biden restarted relations with the agency on his first day of office in 2021.
Fears over US withdrawal from the WHO comes after Trump nominated several allies, such as vaccine skeptic Robert F Kennedy, for top health jobs in the next administration.
Political Move?
Ashish Jha, Biden’s former White House Covid response coordinator and dean of Brown University’s school of public health, notes the transition team wants Trump to withdraw on the first day because of the “symbolism” of reversing Biden’s own inauguration-day move when he reestablished US relations with the WHO.
“There are lots of people who are going to be part of the inner circle of the administration who do not trust the WHO and want to symbolically show on day one that they are out,”. He however added that some in the team wanted to stay in the organization and push to reform it, but another group who believed in cutting ties was winning the argument.
This is the latest in a series of speculations that has trailed Donald Trump’s return to the White House especially as Trump’s inauguration on January 20 draws closer.
