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What changes for the WHO with the exit of the United States

What changes for the WHO with the exit of the United States

With 16% of total funding in 2022-2023, the United States was the WHO's largest funder. But who are the other donors, how do they contribute and how much does the departure of the USA affect the Organization? Facts, numbers and insights

During his first term, Trump initiated procedures to withdraw the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO). Now he wasted no time and on Inauguration Day he signed an executive order to do it again.

“Nothing more than a corrupt globalist scam” that “shamefully covers the tracks of the Chinese Communist Party.” This is how Trump defined the WHO in his last election campaign. In addition to the recriminations on the management of Covid-19, the new president accuses the institution of "asking onerous and disproportionate contributions from the United States". And the League follows him asking him to follow his example.

So here is who and how much the WHO finances.

UNITED STATES, HEAVY WEIGHT OF FUNDING FOR WHO

The exit of the United States will certainly be felt in the coffers of the WHO, where in the two-year period 2024-2025 they paid almost 1 billion out of a total budget of 6.5 billion, to which are added approximately 2 billion in resources linked to emergency or specific purposes. As can be seen from the WHO website , updated in November 2024, the USA contributes 14.53% to the organization's financing, which makes it the main supporter.

PODIUM ALSO FOR GATES AND GAVI

The United States is close behind with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation , with a contribution of 13.67% (646 million dollars again for the two-year period 2024-2025), followed by the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (Gavi), a global cooperation body between public and private entities, whose main purpose is the distribution of vaccines in poor countries. It brings together governments, institutions, private donors and foundations, including the Gates Foundation itself. Its funding to the WHO budget was 10.49%.

THE EU CONTRIBUTION

Fourth place for the European Commission with a contribution of 7.82%, equal to 412 million euros, and fifth for the World Bank with 4.02%.

Source: WHO

WHO PUT HOW MUCH

Trump, among various accusations, complained about China's poor contribution compared to the US. The organization, he said, “continues to ask for onerous and disproportionate contributions from the United States while China, populated by 1.4 billion people equal to 300% more than the United States, pays a contribution that is approximately 90% less than ours. ”. A disproportion from which the USA, according to its president, would emerge "defrauded".

But how are contribution quotas established? The financing of the WHO occurs mainly through two channels: fixed contributions, paid by the member states and set on the basis of parameters such as GDP and population, and voluntary contributions paid not only by the member states, but also by private entities, as in case of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

According to the WHO's public platform on its funding, in the last two years, the United States has given the agency 260 million dollars in fixed contributions and 698 million dollars in voluntary contributions.

WHERE DOES THIS FUNDING GO?

Also from the latest WHO update it can be seen that these resources have been divided mainly into three parts: the first went to the headquarters (which is why it is often accused of costing too much). As The Conversation explained in 2020, “except for polio eradication activities and some health emergencies, such as in conflict-affected areas in Yemen and South Sudan, WHO budgets are rarely spent directly on providing health services or programs ” because “the money is instead used to provide scientific and technical advice to governments”.

“This ranges from assistance in the development of health policies to the collection and use of data and other scientific research evidence, to training. An important aspect of the WHO's work – continued the article – also concerns the production of guidelines for the implementation of various health programs and the response to the main health challenges, as well as the sharing of knowledge between countries”.

The other two thirds of the budget for the two-year period were instead allocated to Africa and what the WHO classifies as the "Eastern Mediterranean region", which extends from Tunisia to Pakistan and where some of the main global health emergencies are located: Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Palestine, Afghanistan.

Among the services provided, 24.44% of the resources went to polio eradication plans; 23.32% to improve access to quality essential health services; 19.35% to acute health emergencies and 5.8% to improving access to medicines, vaccines, diagnostic systems and essential devices for primary healthcare.

WHAT THE WHO 2023 BUDGET SAYS

To better understand what these expenses are that do not have to do with medicines and vaccines, the scientific journalist Roberta Villa, in her newsletter Phosphorus and Honey , reported what was in-depth by the journalist Antonino Michienzi who studied the WHO's 2023 budget.

“In 2023, the WHO spent 4,111 billion dollars, broken down as in the graph below. Services purchased from third parties ( contractual services ) are the largest item of expenditure, since they represent almost 40% of the total. What are we talking about? Of all the suppliers necessary to carry out the various interventions: vaccination campaigns; awareness raising activities, facility construction services; operating costs; consultancy and research contracts. And then there are security expenses, vehicle leasing and so on. In practice, almost all field work is carried out by purchasing services from third parties or, put another way, by paying people on the spot."

“Aid that is thus not only granted from above, but represents a stimulus to the development of local economies”, comments Villa.

THE COST OF STAFF

The other major issue highlighted by WHO's detractors concerns personnel costs. In this regard, Michienzi explains that: “In 2023 the cost for the almost 10,000 people employed by the WHO amounted to just over 1,240 billion dollars, with an average cost per employee of approximately 130,000 dollars. The costs include, in addition to the salary (and of course social security contributions and all legal withholdings), family allowances, travel allowance, health and accident insurance commensurate with the level of risk. This can be very high in certain contexts, such as for the teams tasked with entering the war-torn Gaza Strip to vaccinate half a million children against polio."

Villa adds that those who leave for these missions “at least have a degree in Medicine, preferably with a master's degree in public health or similar; advanced knowledge of English and intermediate knowledge of at least one other language; at least 7 years of experience” and “This is the average treatment, but there are strong differences based on roles and countries, also in relation to the local cost of living”.

THE LEAGUE IN THE WAKE OF THE USA

The League of Matteo Salvini, a great admirer of President Trump, with a bill presented yesterday morning in the Chamber asks to follow the example of the United States. “Italy no longer has to deal with a supranational power center – handsomely financed by Italian taxpayers – that goes hand in hand with multinational pharmaceutical companies,” the deputy prime minister wrote on X.

The WHO is "a bandwagon controlled by a private individual, Bill Gates, uses a third of the budget for staff salaries and during the pandemic managed communication in a schizophrenic way and not compatible with the coordination of the fight against such complex phenomena", the echoed by senator Claudio Borghi and deputy Alberto Bagnai, who led the initiative.

According to the WHO platform, Italy contributes around 70 million euros (and not 100 as Salvini says) which however, explains Pagella Politica , "not all of which comes directly from the State: almost 37 million are the established contributions, i.e. percentage of the Italian GDP, to which are added 20 million of voluntary contributions – in which it is not specified which percentage is paid by the State and which by organisations, private groups and foundations -, and finally 12.5 million are obtained from collections funds".

In short, Villa comments: “A contribution so small that our country is at the bottom of the list of donors. While the exit of the United States will have strong repercussions on the Organization, no one would notice our absence, in 22nd place in the ranking (except us, who would find ourselves excluded from the international forum)".


This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/sanita/oms-stati-uniti/ on Mon, 03 Feb 2025 07:31:49 +0000.