After US cuts funding, WHO chief defends $2.1B budget request by
comparing it with cost of war
[May 20, 2025]
By JAMEY KEATEN
GENEVA (AP) — Stripped of U.S. funding, the World Health Organization
chief on Monday appealed to member countries to support its “extremely
modest” request for a $2.1 billion annual budget by putting that sum
into perspective next to outlays for ad campaigns for tobacco or the
cost of war.
After nearly 80 years of striving to improve human lives and health –-
which critics say it has done poorly or not enough -- the U.N. health
agency is fighting for its own after U.S. President Donald Trump in
January halted funding from the United States, which has traditionally
been WHO’s largest donor.
“Two-point-one billion dollars is the equivalent of global military
expenditure every eight hours,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus said. “Two-point-one billion dollars is the price of one
stealth bomber, to kill people.”
“And $2.1 billion is one-quarter of what the tobacco industry spends on
advertising and promotion every single year. Again, a product that kills
people,” he told the WHO’s annual assembly. “It seems somebody switched
the price tags on what is truly valuable in our world.”
Tedros made no specific reference to the U.S. cuts but has said
previously the U.S. pullout was a “mistake” and urged Washington to
reconsider.
A State Department spokesperson, in an email, confirmed Monday that “The
United States will not field a delegation to participate in the World
Health Assembly.”
WHO has presented a budget for the next two years that is 22% less than
originally planned, largely in response to U.S. and other Western
funding cuts, and says it has landed commitments for about 60% of that.
But it still faces a budget gap of $1.7 billion.
“We know that in the current landscape, mobilizing that sum will be a
challenge. We are not naive to that challenge," Tedros said.
"But for an organization working on the ground in 150 countries with a
vast mission and mandate that member states have given us, $4.2 billion
for two years — or $2.1 billion a year — is not ambitious. It’s
extremely modest,” he said.
Cuts that could cost lives
As a result of the cuts, the U.N. health agency this year has seen a
plunge in its ability to carry out its sweeping mandate to do everything
from recommend reductions in sugar levels in soft drinks to head the
global response to pandemics like COVID-19 or outbreaks like polio or
Ebola.
Tedros and his team have been grappling with a response to the U.S. cuts
as well as reduced outlays from wealthy European countries that are
worried about an expansionist Russia and are putting more money toward
defense, and less toward humanitarian and development aid.
Matthew Kavanagh, the director of Georgetown University’s Center for
Global Health Policy and Politics, said other countries have used the
U.S. cut in aid “as cover to do their maneuvering, with many countries
in Europe reducing aid.”
“The WHO faces an existential crisis that goes well beyond a budget gap
to the question of whether this sort of multilateralism can succeed in
addressing global health in this new era of nationalism and
misinformation,” he said, alluding to discord between many countries
that could cost lives.
“Literally millions will likely die needlessly on the current trajectory
and the world’s health ministers do not seem capable of a coherent
response,” Kavanagh added.
Pandemic preparedness on the agenda
On tap for the nine-day World Health Assembly are two major advances
that are aimed to buttress WHO’s financial strength and bolster the
world’s ability to cope with future pandemics.
[to top of second column]
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Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus, left, delivers his statement, during the
opening of the 78th World Health Assembly at the European
headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, Monday,
May 19, 2025. (Magali Girardin/Keystone via AP)
 Member countries are expected to
agree to raise annual dues, known as “assessed contributions,” by
20% to support WHO finances and reduce dependency on governments’
voluntary contributions — which change each year and make up over
half of the budget.
They are also expected to agree to a hard-wrought “ pandemic treaty
” that was born of a desire to avoid any replay of the patchy,
unequal response to COVID-19 when the next — and inevitable, most
experts say — pandemic hits.
Among other things, the treaty would guarantee that countries that
share critical samples of viruses will receive any resulting tests,
medicines and vaccines and give WHO up to 20% of such products to
make sure poorer countries can have access to them.
“Every World Health Assembly is significant, but this year’s is
especially so," Tedros said. "This is truly a historic moment.”
The treaty’s effectiveness will face doubts when the U.S. — which
poured billions into speedy work by pharmaceutical companies to
develop COVID-19 vaccines — is sitting out, and because countries
face no penalties if they ignore it, a common issue in international
law.
Kavanagh said passage of the treaty “could be a significant victory
— evidence that the U.S. government may no longer be indispensable
in global health” and could offer an opportunity for developing
nations in the “global South” over the longer term.
Management shake-up as critics blast WHO
Trump has long derided WHO, including back in his first term when he
pulled the United States out over its alleged kowtowing to China and
other alleged missteps in the Covid pandemic. President Joe Biden
put the U.S. back in.
On his first day back in office in January, Trump signed an
executive order to pause future transfers of U.S. government funds
to the WHO, recall U.S. government staff working with it, and
announce a formal pullout by next January — under a one-year
timetable required under U.S. law.
Other opponents continue to lash out at WHO. CitizenGo, an activist
group that supports right-to-life and religious liberty issues,
protested Monday against the pandemic treaty outside the U.N.
compound in Geneva where WHO's meeting was taking place.
The rally included a balloon sculpture in the shape of the world and
a banner inveighing against “globalist elites” and showing an image
of Tedros and billionaire Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, a major
WHO supporter, shaking hands while surrounded by dollars.
“In the aftermath of Covid, the WHO got together and thought was a
good idea to centralize even more power,” said CitizenGo campaigner
Sebastian Lukomski, accusing WHO of an effort to "remove more
fundamental freedoms and not learn from the mistakes that were
taking place during COVID.”
In the run-up to the assembly, WHO has been cleaning house and
cutting costs.
At a meeting on its budget last week, Tedros — a former Ethiopian
health and foreign minister – announced a shake-up of top management
that included the exit of key adviser Dr. Michael Ryan from the job
as emergencies chief.
Tedros said last week that the loss of U.S. funds and other
assistance have left the WHO with a salary gap of more than $500
million.
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