Drastic cuts forced on the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) by President Donald Trump withdrawing U.S. taxpayer dollars from the globalist behemoth are hitting hard, the organization’s chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus lamented.
Ghebreyesus told the agency’s annual executive board meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, that 2025 was “undeniably one of the most difficult years in our organisation’s history”, with many donors tightening their belts, AFP reports.
“Significant cuts to our funding left us with no choice but to reduce the size of our workforce,” he said.
The United States reserved the right to withdraw when it joined the W.H.O. in 1948 — on condition of one year’s notice, and meeting its financial obligations in full for that fiscal year.
Trump confirmed the U.S. was exiting the agency on the first day of his return to office in January, 2025, having criticised the organisation for being too “China-centric” during the coronavirus pandemic.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it took the decision due to the W.H.O.’s mishandling of the pandemic, an inability to reform and political influence from member states.
While the notice is now up, Washington has witheld its 2024 or 2025 dues, owing around $260 million.
The U.S. has been the W.H.O.’s top individual donor in recent years, with Washington contributing more than $400 million to the organization in 2020.
As the notice countdown expired, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the W.H.O. had “tarnished and trashed everything that America has done for it”, with “the insults to America” continuing to the end.
At the executive board, Israel said the W.H.O. had become politicised and the U.S. withdrawal should trigger a rethink about the U.N. subsidiary’s future and purpose.
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