U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that he is terminating relationship of the U.S. with the WHO over the way it has handled the Coronavirus. He accuses the organisation of being China’s puppet. He launched repeated threats to eliminate funding for WHO, which amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
The President said that the organisation failed to reform itself upon demands from him. He said Chinese officials “ignored their reporting obligations” about the virus to the WHO and pressured it to “mislead the world” when the virus was discovered.
He said, “China has total control over the World Health Organization despite only paying $40 million per year compared to what the United States has been paying which is approximately $450 million a year. We have detailed the reforms that it must make and engaged with them directly but they have refused to act.”
He adds, “Because they have failed to make the requested and greatly needed reforms, we will be today terminating our relationship with the World Health Organization and redirecting those funds to other worldwide and deserving urgent global public health needs.”
He is a President that has for a long time questioned the value and need of the United Nations and multilateralism while pursuing an ‘America First’ agenda. Since joining office, he has quit the UNHRC, UNESCO, Paris climate accord and the Iran nuclear deal.
