‘This Is a Fearful Time’: Public Health Leaders Concerned About WHO Withdrawal

Withdrawing from the World Health Organization (WHO) diminishes the influence of the U.S. on global health, and leaves the nation unprepared in the face of any future pandemics, public health officials said in response to President Trump’s decision to pull out of the organization.

Georges Benjamin, MD, executive director of the American Public Health Association (APHA), said not participating in the WHO means the U.S. “can’t impact its interests in health on the global stage.”

It also “cripples” the WHO’s funding, which impacts other nations as well, Benjamin said. “The coordinated global response to address worldwide problems becomes severely impeded,” he said in an interview with MedPage Today.

Carol McLay, DrPH, MPH, RN, president of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC), said in a statement that the “lack of a coordinated effort puts all nations at risk and weakens our combined efforts to combat infections.”

“While APIC respects each administration’s right to set and renegotiate global agreements, we believe infectious disease issues and pandemic preparedness should transcend political ideologies and global divisions,” McLay said. “We are concerned that withdrawal from the WHO risks weakening international collaboration, which is built up over time and is essential for effective infection prevention and pandemic response.”

In a statement, WHO said it “regrets” the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw, noting that the U.S. was a founding member of the agency — a part of the United Nations — in 1948, and “has participated in shaping and governing WHO’s work ever since, alongside 193 other Member States.”

“For over seven decades, WHO and the USA have saved countless lives and protected Americans and all people from health threats,” the statement continued. “Together, we ended smallpox, and together we have brought polio to the brink of eradication.”

WHO has been a driving force in gains made toward fighting diseases around the world, including AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. It coordinates the world’s response to disease outbreaks that could threaten global health, such as mpox and Ebola. It has also helped distribute vaccines, supplies, and treatments, and helps set guidelines for treatment of some health conditions.

Leaving the agency also could exclude the U.S. from WHO-coordinated initiatives like determining the yearly composition of the influenza vaccine, and from quick access to WHO databases that enable the production of vaccines and medications.

Trump cited several reasons for withdrawing from the WHO, blaming it for a bungled COVID-19 response, and noting that the U.S. pays for a substantial proportion of its budget, while China pays far less. The agency’s budget is around $3.5 billion per year, and the U.S. contributed between $160 million and $815 million each year in the last decade.

Trump tried to pull the U.S. out of the WHO in July 2020, but it never came to fruition because the country must give a 1-year notice if it decides to leave, and former President Joe Biden overturned Trump’s directive on his first day in office in 2021.

Even the conservative-leaning Cato Institute disagreed with Trump’s decision to withdraw from the WHO. In a statement, Cato senior fellow Jeffrey Singer, MD, said that “in our globally interconnected era, cooperating in reducing the spread of deadly communicable and infectious diseases that can come to our shores is putting America first.”

Instead, Trump “should leverage our country’s financial contribution to the WHO by pressing reform,” Singer said in the statement. “But the U.S. should not pull out of this important organization.”

Benjamin said civil society organizations like APHA will continue to work with WHO, but he has concerns that U.S. government officials will not be able to advance their WHO-related work.

“This administration is so hostile that people may be afraid they’ll retaliate against them so that these soft relationships on the government side may not persist,” Benjamin said. “People are afraid. This is a fearful time.”

“When they stopped WHO participation last time, I don’t think people were afraid,” Benjamin said. “I think they’re afraid this time.”

The Associated Press contributed reporting to this story.