The World Health Organization on Monday issued its starkest warning yet on the consequences of the abrupt cessation of U.S. global health funding, saying it is threatening to reverse years of progress in the fight against diseases like HIV, tuberculosis, and measles.
Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called on the Trump administration to reconsider its withdrawal of funding for international aid programs. Barring that possibility, Tedros said the United States has a responsibility to manage the pullback in ways that do not endanger the lives of people who rely on the programs it funds.
“The U.S. administration has been extremely generous over many years. And of course it’s within its rights to decide what it supports and to what extent,” Tedros said during a news conference in Geneva. “But the U.S. also has a responsibility to ensure that if it withdraws direct funding for countries, it’s done in an orderly and humane way that allows them to find alternative sources of funding.”
International aid was among the first targets of Elon Musk’s efforts to slash U.S. government spending, with his so-called Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE operation effectively doing away with the congressionally created agency U.S. Agency for International Development or USAID. Funding distribution was stopped without notice and most of USAID’s staff have been put on administrative leave.
The impact was felt swiftly in many corners of the world, with programs that relied on U.S. funds halted without warning.
Several WHO officials recounted the impact the U.S. funding cuts are already having on disease control efforts in multiple countries, including the rollout of promising malaria vaccines and mass campaigns to vaccinate against measles at a time when the incidence of the highly infectious disease is surging.
“We are on the brink of a crisis, one that could reverberate across borders and generations if we don’t act decisively,” said Handaa Enkh-Amgalan, a member of the WHO Civil Society Task Force on Tuberculosis.
Tedros said malaria control programs are being badly hit already.
“There are now severe disruptions to the supply of malaria diagnostics, medicines, and insecticide-treated bed nets due to stock outs, delayed delivery, or lack of funding,” he said.
Over the last two decades the U.S. has been the largest bilateral donor in the fight against malaria, the WHO director-general said — work that has helped to avert an estimated 2.2 billion cases and 12.7 million deaths.
“If disruptions continue we could see an additional 15 million cases of malaria and 107,000 deaths this year alone, reversing 15 years of progress,” he said.
Tedros prefaced his remarks by saying he was not speaking about the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw the U.S. from the WHO, announced on the day of President Trump’s inauguration.
The director-general was in Washington last week, where he was photographed with Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Tedros said the purpose of his trip dealt with other commitments and he did not ask to meet with either Trump or Secretary of State Marco Rubio.