U.S. is terminating its relationship with World Health Organization, Trump says | Hacker News Reader

U.S. is terminating its relationship with World Health Organization, Trump says

reuters.com

51 pointsFarbodkhz52 comments

This is not going to reduce China's influence on the WHO.

Who is going to be the trusted source now? The NIH?

Every year Trump proposes budget cuts to the NIH, and Congress ignores him and increases the budget.

I bet this money will end up in private companies' pocket.

I hate to see you getting down-voted because I do agree with point one. It won't diminish Chinese influence at all. In fact, it might increase their influence. China has always worked to replace America, why not at the UN?

China and Russia have been increasing soft power significantly over the past few years by filling voids the USA has left. We have been leaving the table, and they have been taking our seats.

It will surely increase China's influence over the WHO itself, but so what? It will substantially decrease the influence of the WHO in general. It is likely that Australia and other countries will cut funding as well.

The real story may well end up be that China used the WHO to benefit them at the expense of everyone else, severely damaging the reputation of the WHO.

If it were up to me, I would do the same thing as Trump. I'm not saying that Trump isn't distracting people, but that does not mean he is wrong about the WHO. China has a lot of influence over the WHO, and the actions of the WHO benefited China while slowing down the rest of the world's response to the pandemic.

At best, the WHO is dangerously ineffective. But seeing as how China groomed their leader, who had previously helped China cover up cholera outbreaks outside of their factories, it seems likely that the WHO was just helping buy China time while they stocked up on supplies, while it spread.

I'm curious, can anyone defend the WHO, or justify giving them money? Let China pay them all they want. It is essentially just the de-facto CHO at this point.

Once upon a time, the USSR quit the UN Security Council in protest over something or other.

China's seat was held by Taiwan at the time, so we wound up with a UN-endorsed anti-communist war in Korea despite China and Russia both being actually communist.

They rejoined the Security Council after that.

The goal seems to be to reduce the WHO's influence, not China's.

The US funds about $118 million per year to the who (roughly double what China pays).

https://www.who.int/about/finances-accountability/funding/as...

I would love to see some of the money routed to NIH.gov instead. They have lost a great deal of funding over the years and we have a greater need for scientific research of diseases now more than ever.

Dividing global response isn't bad enough?

He already cut NIH and is now doing the same with WHO. These both are bad decisions from an incompetent leader.

This is a sad situation... Again.

Agreed, if we had a fallback solution it wouldn't be so bad, but as is, I just feel like the whole world is the worse for it.

Hopefully something good will come of it, but I can't see what from here. Funding cuts to CDC, now this. I just wonder whether the WHO could have been repaired as-is?

> I just wonder whether the WHO could have been repaired as-is But that's the thing. The WHO isn't perfect and I'm uncomfortable with how much power China has inside of the UN in general, but I don't understand why people are saying it's broken. I've been searching for those arguments and the only sources I can find are conspiracy theorists and far-right news organizations. Could you please explain the reasons you think the WHO isn't functioning?

President Trump has spent the past four years trying to cut funding to the NIH and congress has repeatedly overridden him. I would be shocked if that money went anywhere but the places he thinks will fire up his base of voters.

If the US pays a magnitude of money more than China to the WHO, how are we to believe that the WHO is China's puppet, and not an extension of western power? How is China so clever with its maneuverings that its relatively puny contributions go so far?

The theory goes (which I'm not espousing just relaying) that you could simply bribe top WHO officials and avoid having to provide magnitudes of money.

The WHO has been in scandal before regarding [exorbitant spending on travel.] (https://apnews.com/3d8569ea7bd140e4ba02bc1712cd12ab)

I don't know if it's bribery at work here. Rather, it's anger at American behavior over the last decades which is pushing it closer to China. America is the WHO's primary superpower sponsor, and protector. In the courtship of a new sponsor, China, it could be just that: stoking anger and offering a choice.

I don't know either. I think all of this is obviously couched in the fact that the poor initial US response to Coronavirus has made it politically expedient to [make this a story about China] (https://www.foxnews.com/politics/gop-memo-advises-candidates...)

That doesn't mean the WHO or China have clean hands, just that in an election year for the US my bias would lean towards this being about politics.

That's one of the biggest flaws of the Trump administration's thinking - that everything is always about money.

In my limited experience, people join NGOs like the WHO because they seek influence, recognition, or personal "mission" based fulfillment.

If China has been developing relationships and giving officials the above, then it absolutely could have influence far outside its financial contributions.

Because they've actually have been trying to manipulate this institution and the west has generally frowned on corruption in necessary institutions. Its one of the big things that is in the west core beliefs. This is why this is taken seriously. At this point, it would be against the US beliefs to manipulate the WHO so the only thing it can do is build a new one free of corruption from the ground up. It happens a lot.

East is corrupt and west is not. Right!

Does it ever occur to you that other agencies might have better relationships and trust with other countries? That people might just not respond very well to bullying money or not ?

I'm saying a communist dictatorship is corrupt. Most of what "western" and I include japan, Taiwan, SE Asian, and Korea in that is nitpicking for the greater good.

I think if those agency have better relations with countries who ideology and goals are stark contrast with your that is corruption at least in the west eyes. If that agency ideology has change its very reasonable to leave.

What do you expect the US to do? Let very blatant misuse of their resource and personnel continue. I'm pretty sure most Americans would let their country burn before that occurred.

I don't agree with this. Freezing of funding, investigating, etc. is fine, we should. But this is like the withdrawing of ambassadors. Not quite breaking off diplomatic relations but we really should want more cooperation with US and UN officials, not less.

How does this make the US safer?

It gives the US the ability to create a non-corrupt institution. Right now the WHO is not a reliable global partner. If the US can find other people that feel this way you get a more efficient institution that possibly is more efficient.

Whats not safe is continuing to work with someone obvious playing fast and lose with the world.

> WHO is not a reliable global partner

That's based off of what evidence? When I search for "WHO corruption" I only find conspiracy theory youTube videos and far-right leaning publications that have a leg in that race.

Besides, as was said earlier, this is the equivalent of pulling diplomats out of a country. If corruption is the issue (and I'm not convinced it is) then you'd cut funding. This is a political stunt which is trying to draw attention away from an administrations failed response to a pandemic.

I'm sorry, wasn't the interview with Dr. Bruce Aylward enough to convince you that there's something seriously wrong with the organization's leadership?

No, I see a physician-epidemiologist by training from Newfoundland Canada struggling to manage a global pandemic with two global superpowers in a political arm wrestling match on the global stage when he knows he needs both to cooperate.

There’s a plan to create that reliable global partner? And who’s playing fast and loose?

Here's President Donald Trump's announcement. Hong Kong's special trade status is also revoked.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/12664558344579686...

Thank you for posting this, it was nice to see Honk Kong's status under review; does congress need to approve? We have tools we can use to reign in China's harmful behavior - perhaps next in the dock for consideration should be China's Most Favored Nation status....

in line with Make America Great Again..

Let's be clear here. This is not about China.

The US under Trump wants to make billions of profits because of Covid-19.

The WHO wants to make the medicine available for free.

That's why he is out of the WHO and frankly, if that is the reason, the WHO is better off without the US.

Ps. I have no doubt that he would buy the stock of the creator of the vaccine to earn billions with his access to private information.

Somehow withdrawing funding from the current only worldwide public health organization at the beginning of a pandemic seems ?? shortsighted.

Is trump admitting that he is incapable of negotiating his desired changes in WHO functionality, that his ability to communicate and work with international players is so deficient that his only option is to take his baseball bat and baseball and go home?

Or is this all a political move to attempt to shift the 'blame' for his/Trump's failings to some other boogeyman? My bet is on this option -- he failed to recognize the magnitude of the epidemic, he failed to take timely and early actions to mitigate the impact on the US economy and lives, he repeatedly minimized the size of the tsunami of death that was approaching our shores, he failed to motivate his FDA/CDC to get working PCR viral tests immediately and produce them in the amounts needed, he failed to coordinate obtaining necessary PPE supplies for the 50 states leading to a dysfunctional free-for-all where states were bidding against each other and FEMA confiscated all shipments they could find, he refused to take any responsibility for all of the above failures, he has recommended use of experimental medical treatments out of clinical trials (hydroxychloroquine), he has actively interfered with the public health necessity of transitioning the US to a "mask wearing culture" by making it a macho / political question instead of a life saving public health intervention, he has demanded that States not follow the 'reopening' metrics advanced by his own covid-19 group.... need I continue?

It's 100% blame-shifting.

We all saw this happening in China for 2-3 months before it got here, then in Italy a month before it got here. It was all over the news. And we did nothing, as you note.

So now the line is that the WHO abetted some sort of cover-up? Does everyone have the memory of a goldfish?

Who's performance has been abysmal, and they've proven to be the lap dog of the CCP. I totally agreed with the funding hiatus, this is a surprise move to me. There's a lot we don't know.

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