Implications of US exit from WHO, Paris Accords
THE entire world is justifiably alarmed by the decision of United States President Donald Trump to withdraw from the WHO and the Paris Accords on climate change. These actions are contained in an executive order he signed after his inauguration on January 20.
America plays a major role in global affairs. It is a leading contributor to the WHO. This means it has contributed immensely to funding health and human services programmes globally, especially in developing countries.
The US contributes about 24 per cent of the annual budget of WHO, meaning it underwrites a chunk of the annual budget of this critical UN agency and is a significant stakeholder in various health and human development programmes around the world.
One of the programmes to be affected by Trump’s withdrawal of the US from WHO is the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. This programme is instrumental in the fight against HIV/AIDS worldwide. Ending it will be a huge setback for the US and the global community.
Allied with this is the global fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. This fund has provided critical support as grants for the initiatives in these focal areas. By withdrawing the US from WHO, Trump has set a cog in the wheel of progress.
Rolling back the gigantic strides made in these areas could threaten global health and a wider implication is the possibility of the uncontrollable outbreak of epidemics.
There are other programmes covering polio, rubella, and vaccine development, as well as WHO’s Health Emergencies Programme and USAID’s Global Health Security Agenda, which are at risk from this unusual decision.
The world is still working hard to prevent the resurgence of the COVID-19 pandemic, which ravaged the global community during Trump’s first term. Even though he lived in denial of the virus, Trump eventually received the vaccine.
His refusal to support WHO in his first term based on unproven allegations was widely condemned as a major obstacle to the efforts by countries and development partners to roll back serious threats from diseases. Unfortunately, Trump appears not to have learnt any lessons from his previous misadventure.
The US joined the WHO based on a resolution of Congress in 1948 and that remains binding on it. Besides, the US remains a state party to the WHO Constitution, which effectively designates it as the directing and coordinating authority on international health and the International Health Regulations 2005.
This outlines the framework for epidemic preparedness and response. In addition to the obligations of the US towards the global health organisation is the fact that some WHO initiatives have their headquarters in the US capital, Washington DC, and collaborate with its health institutions across a broad spectrum of focal areas.
Withdrawing from the global health body at this time will not augur well for the world. It behoves the US Congress to critically review this affront on its constitutional mandate and move resolutely to check this ill-informed and reckless gambit by Trump.
Withdrawing from the Paris Accords is an underlying motive Trump does not want the US to continue to pay the price of global leadership. The accords have been instrumental in extracting commitments from major polluters to adopt policies and actions that strengthen global environmental health.
Withdrawing from the accords signposts a total abandonment of the goal to reduce global warming to between 1.5°C and 2°C. By dumping the Paris Agreement, Trump demonstrates a worrying aversion to threats from climate change.
Denying the reality of climate change and its deleterious effects on the world is not the way to go. No country can exist in isolation. Developing countries will also be hard hit if this step is not reversed.
