The World Health Organization has a poor track record, but the most recent blunder beggars belief.
by
Henry Miller and Jeff Stier City Journal April 18, 2022
The Covid-19 pandemic should be a wakeup call that there is something
very wrong—irreparable, even—at the World Health Organization. This
revelation shouldn't come as a surprise. After all, the WHO is a
constituent of the relentlessly incompetent and politicized United
Nations.
From the beginning, government officials, health experts, and analysts have raised concerns about the WHO's bungled response to the coronavirus, accusing the organization of misplaced trust in the Chinese government, which initially tried to conceal the
outbreak in Wuhan. Taro Aso, Japan's deputy prime minister and finance
minister, even derided the WHO as the "Chinese Health Organization."
Rather than taking Beijing to task for its attempted cover-up, WHO
director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus praised Chinese
president Xi Jinping for his "very rare leadership" and lauded the
Chinese Communist Party's "transparency" in responding to the virus. Few
would dispute that Tedros and the WHO acted tardily in declaring a global health emergency and, thereafter, a pandemic. But the most recent WHO blunder beggars belief.
Medicago, a Canadian company, developed a Covid vaccine synthesized in the Nicotiniana plant, a relative of tobacco. In clinical testing, the vaccine proved 71
percent effective against all variants studied prior to the emergence
of Omicron and 75 percent effective against the Delta variant. Canada's
department of health approved the vaccine for domestic use in February,
but its global distribution has encountered an unexpected obstacle: the
WHO won't consider approving the vaccine for wider use because of the
manufacturer's ties to U.S.–Swiss tobacco company Philip Morris
International, which owns a roughly one-third equity stake in Medicago.
Wealthy countries currently have a plentiful supply of Covid
vaccines, but the WHO's authorization of the Medicago vaccine, Covifenz,
is critical to expanding vaccine access in low- and middle-income
countries, as it would qualify the vaccine for inclusion in the
organization's COVAX global
vaccine program. Access to Covifenz would particularly help countries
lacking sophisticated medical infrastructure because, unlike some of the
other Covid vaccines, Covifenz doesn't require storage in an ultra-cold
freezer. Medicago might find a workaround—Philip Morris could divest
itself from partial ownership of the company, for instance—but the WHO's
current intransigence denies relief to countries its COVAX program is
designed to aid.
This most recent folly should prompt the United States, as the WHO's
biggest donor, to conduct a thorough review of the organization's
competence and values. Global public health is consistent with American
interests not only because we are a generous people but also because, as
Covid has reminded us, public-health battles not won overseas will find
their way to our shores. We would be derelict to contribute money to
public-health organizations without mandating good stewardship.
American taxpayers are the largest contributors to
the WHO's approximately $2 billion budget. Like other UN organizations,
the WHO is plagued by wasteful spending, disregard for transparency,
incompetence, and a failure to adhere to even basic democratic
standards. Its Western Hemisphere subsidiary, the Pan American Health
Organization, supports antidemocratic regimes and actually "weakens public health rather than strengthening it," according to a Wall Street Journal article.
The WHO's history is rife with ineptitude and ethically compromised
dealings. Under its polio eradication policy in Syria, for example,
health-care workers were allowed to work only with the brutal, corrupt
regime of Syrian president Bashar Assad but not in rebel-held areas.
Thus, while the WHO effectively contained polio within government
territory, the disease spread throughout rebel areas. The WHO has also been widely condemned for
failing to raise the alarm about the dangers of Ebola in West Africa in
2014. The WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is
known to promulgate alarmist reports frequently contradicted by
regulators worldwide. When a U.S. congressional committee attempted to
investigate (well-founded) charges of corruption and conflicts of
interest within the agency, the IARC rebuffed the effort.
What explains the WHO's dubious track record? Look to the structure of the UN.
First, the UN is essentially a monopoly. "Consumers" of UN products
and services cannot punish the organization by patronizing competitors.
To the contrary, inadequacy is too often rewarded with additional
resources. Unlike in the private sector, where failed projects get shut
down, bureaucrats often champion and clamor to expand programs that
clearly don't work.
Second, UN officials are rewarded for making the bureaucratic
machinery run—for producing reports, guidelines, white papers, and
agreements, and for holding meetings—regardless of whether their efforts
prove effective. Bureaucrats typically sacrifice quality and veracity
for consensus.
Third, no authority holds the UN accountable, and no electorate can
oust UN officials when they act contrary to the public interest.
Finally, the organization is no meritocracy. Leadership candidates'
country or region of origin seems to be valued more highly than their
qualifications, and countries seconding staff to the WHO understandably
don't send their best talent.
The United States' funding of UN activities exceeds that of every other country. In 2020, the U.S. contributed more than $11 billion, which accounted for just under one-fifth of funding for the organization's collective budget.
Unless an effective oversight and auditing entity can be created to
oversee the WHO, the U.S. should discontinue its funding and instead
support an entity that we can hold accountable for protecting global
public health—a mission both worthy and necessary, as Covid reminds us.
Henry I. Miller,
a physician and molecular biologist, is a senior fellow at the Pacific
Research Institute. He was the founding director of the Office of
Biotechnology at the U.S. Food & Drug Administration. Jeff Stier is a senior fellow at the Taxpayers Protection Alliance.
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