US Biggest Donor, Trump Signs Executive Order To Leave WHO

JAKARTA - President Donald Trump signed an executive order for the United States to leave the World Health Organization (WHO) immediately after being sworn in as president on Monday, when Washington was the organization's largest donor.

President Trump signed an executive order for the start of the US withdrawal process from the WHO, one of dozens of executive orders he signed on the first day of office after being sworn in, quoted from BBC January 21.

Trump said WHO had failed to act independently of "the inappropriate political influence of WHO member states" and asked for "bantimizing US donations" and disproportionately compared to the amount given by other countries.

"The World's health deceive us, everyone cheated the United States. It will not happen again," Trump said when signing an executive order after being sworn in.

This will see Washington leave the United Nations health agency within 12 months, halting all financial contributions to its work.

Trump's order reads the government will stop negotiations on the WHO pandemic agreement while withdrawals are ongoing.

US government personnel working with WHO will be withdrawn and moved, and the government will look for partners to take over the required WHO activities, according to the order.

The government will review, cancel and replace the 2024 US Global Health Safety Strategy as soon as possible, the order said.

The United States is by far the largest donor of WHO with a composition of around 18 percent of the total funding. WHO is known to have a budget of 6.8 billion US dollars.

The exit of the US is likely to jeopardize programs across organizations, according to some experts inside and outside the WHO, especially those dealing with tuberculosis, the world's largest killer infectious disease, as well as HIV/AIDS and other health emergencies.

After the US, the WHO's largest donor was the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, followed by the European Commission and the World Bank. Complementing the top five donors, Germany contributed 3 percent of WHO funding.

The order to leave WHO was not surprising, after he took similar steps during his government period in 2020, accusing WHO of helping China's efforts to "ignor the world" about the origins of COVID.

The WHO firmly denies the allegations and says it continues to pressure Beijing to share data to determine whether COVID emerges from human contact with infected animals or due to research into similar viruses in domestic laboratories.

Trump also suspended US contributions to the agency, which cost nearly $200 million in 2020-2021 compared to the previous two-year budget, as the agency struggled with the world's worst health emergency in a century.

Under the law in the US, in addition to the exit process requiring a one-year notification period, the US must also complete the payment of all unpaid costs.

Separately, public health experts criticized President Trump's decision to leave the WHO, warning there would be consequences for the health of Americans.

Ashish Jha, who previously worked as Covid-19 response coordinator under President Biden, previously warned out of WHO "not only endangering the health of people around the world, but also US scientific leadership and skills".

"This is a very bad presidential decision. The withdrawal is a serious injury to the health of the world, but a deeper wound to the US," said global public health expert and professor fromLAy University, Lawrence Gostin.

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