
The U.S. is withdrawing from the World Health Organization - systemvoltage
https://www.wsj.com/articles/white-house-says-u-s-has-pulled-out-of-the-world-health-organization-11594150928
======
fermienrico
I don't know what the cost/benefit ratio is with WHO but as a non-expert, I
found the WHO's leadership during this unprecedented times as weak, un-
authoritative and frankly misguided/misinformed. Without stirring up
conspiracy theories, everyone should watch this WHO official who just hangs up
when they're asked about Taiwan:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM)

That makes me think that the whole organization has been bought out and sold
off. But, that's just my knee-jerk reaction and a gut feeling.

That said, what's there to pay to be a member? Why not just stay in there like
everyone else?

~~~
paranoidrobot
Asking these sorts of political questions to scientists puts them in a
difficult position.

If he answers in the affirmative, he pisses off China, and will likely see
them retaliate by withdrawing from cooperation at a time when that could have
severe impacts on the world's ability to deal with a pandemic.

If he answers in the negative, he pisses off Taiwan, a lot of people, and a
lot of countries who are also not willing to stand up to China on this issue.

And what's the benefit for asking this of an epidemiologist. He's not there to
give personal political opinions, he's there to be an expert on a specific
subject.

As for the rest of the issues - I know you're not specifically saying it, but
there's a lot of folks that blame the WHO for not warning people about this,
or delaying announcements.

The WHO were quite early in warning that countries should be prepared for
this, that there should be greater efforts put in attempting to limit it's
spread.

There is some truth that they didn't declare it a pandemic as early as
everyone wanted, they had to wait for it to meet official definitions of being
a pandemic.

The WHO declaring a pandemic, however, didn't mean countries couldn't act
earlier to stop it.

~~~
Isinlor
Why did he not say so?

"I'm sorry, but this is a political question which I'm not able to answer.".

or

"You know this question puts me in a difficult position and it is not up to
me."

To me it seems his mind is made up. He does what China wants. He doesn't try
to appear neutral. To him Taiwan is China.

But either way - it shows how great power China has over international bodies
and it is scary.

Besides questions of WHO competency, we have to ask ourselves whether WHO even
has good intentions in the first place.

~~~
paranoidrobot
The reporter wasn't stupid, they were hoping for some kind of reaction.

It's not too dissimilar to taunting someone hoping they'll do something you
can latch onto.

The lack of reaction / dodging was clearly enough to drive up a shitstorm. Any
attempt to acknowledge and answer the question, even in deflecting it, was
going to cause more trouble.

> it shows how great power China has over international bodies and it is
> scary.

It shows how much power China has in general.

Look at Hong Kong. Most countries are doing nothing except making vague
statements for peace, at most some are offering refuge for some who want to
escape.

~~~
Isinlor
> Any attempt to acknowledge and answer the question, even in deflecting it,
> was going to cause more trouble.

This is certainly not true. WHO lawyer gave later lengthy explanation of WHO
position on Taiwan on a press conference and nobody cared. It wasn't the issue
of Taiwan that shocked people. Everyone following news knows that UN is
politically paralyzed institution.

What was shocking, to me and people I know, was the extend of fear and
disingenuity of a member of WHO. He has clearly western roots and we expect
from him western political culture. He is the man in authority position who we
are supposed to trust. But this behavior was all but trustworthy. He was
deceiving. He was laying and he was voluntarily following Chinese party line.

The reporter was not stupid, indeed. It's her job to ask difficult questions.

I applaud her for opening my eyes to the fact that I should trust WHO only
about us much as I trust China.

> Look at Hong Kong. Most countries are doing nothing except making vague
> statements for peace, at most some are offering refuge for some who want to
> escape.

Again, this is something that I tend to expect. Western states have nothing to
gain there and we have no obligations to these 7.5 million people.

> It shows how much power China has in general.

I guess maybe I was naive, but my a prior would be that USA would have a lot
more power. The fact that western people are bowing before China in this way
is new to me.

------
czzr
This is so, so stupid. The world has a limited number of fragile, deeply
flawed but utterly necessary coordination mechanisms. To throw one of them
aside in a fit of pique is the act of an angry toddler, smashing things he
doesn’t understand.

~~~
esaym
How in the world can you really say or think that? This was the WHO's official
stance in January 2020: "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese
authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the
novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan"

If that isn't clear evidence that they are beyond useless, then I don't know
what is.

~~~
dylan-m
Taking that quote at face value: at the time, they trusted the Chinese
authorities. This isn't terribly unreasonable. I think in retrospect we can
say, yeah, they obviously shouldn't have trusted the Chinese authorities then,
and they definitely shouldn't trust them in the future. But at the time, the
idea that trusting them was a bad idea was more a thing people said than
something backed by solid evidence.

Alas, sometimes large bureaucracies take a while to catch up with common
sense. (See also, fax machines).

There actually _is_ solid, undeniable evidence now, which is great! Let's see
how they apply that in the future.

~~~
smileypete
'Health officials in Taipei said they alerted the WHO at the end of December
about the risk of human-to-human transmission of the new virus but said its
concerns were not passed on to other countries.'

[https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-
df28cc3c6...](https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68)

[paywalled - but going via a google search gets round it]

'Wuhan virus probably is spreading between people (2020-01-04)

Wuhan officials also said on Friday that no evidence of human to human
transmission has been found so far.

But Ho said it is possible that the virus can be passed from person to person,
and this is likely to have already happened in the Wuhan outbreak.'

[https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1500994-20200104.h...](https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1500994-20200104.htm)

'Wuhan pneumonia: what we know about the new virus and how you can stop
yourself getting sick (2020-1-9)

Dr Ho Pak-leung, from the University of Hong Kong, said the new coronavirus
was believed to be spread through droplets.

"The public should wear disposable surgical masks in crowded places," Ho said.
"They should also clean their hands frequently."

[https://today.line.me/hk/article/Wuhan+pneumonia+what+we+kno...](https://today.line.me/hk/article/Wuhan+pneumonia+what+we+know+about+the+new+virus+and+how+you+can+stop+yourself+getting+sick-
PoWrD5)

'Q&A with HK microbiologist Yuen Kwok-yung who helped confirm coronavirus'
human spread

Tell us what you saw in Wuhan (on 17th Jan).

Let me tell you what I think is the truth. All the places we visited in Wuhan
looked like they were putting on a show. Whatever we asked them, they answered
as if they had prepared hard with well-thought-out replies. However, Zhong
Nanshan was extremely sharp - he kept asking follow-up questions, like: "Is
there anything else?" "Are there any more cases?" "Is it really like you're
saying, just that many cases?"

Eventually, under pressure, they relented and told us it seemed that there was
one patient in the neurosurgery department who had infected 14 medical
workers. But they also said those medical staff had not had their diagnoses
confirmed.

...

We met a deputy-level national leader and officials from the National Health
Commission. They were all quite frank. Our expert group reported that the
situation was severe, and there must have been cases of human transmission,
and that preventive measures needed to be taken immediately.'

[https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/exclusive-qa-
wit...](https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/exclusive-qa-with-hong-
kong-microbiologist-yuen-kwok-yung-who-helped-confirm)

~~~
vonmoltke
> 'Health officials in Taipei said they alerted the WHO at the end of December
> about the risk of human-to-human transmission of the new virus but said its
> concerns were not passed on to other countries.'

> [https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-
> df28cc3c6...](https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-
> df28cc3c6a68)

The Guardian disagrees: [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-
in-a-su...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-in-a-
superpower-struggle-the-inside-story-of-the-whos-response-to-coronavirus)

> “Why did the WHO Ignore an email from Taiwanese health officials in late
> December alerting them to the possibility that coronvirus could be
> transmitted between humans?” the president asked in a tweet on Friday,
> echoing a claim made by Taipei.

> However, the Taiwanese email appears to have made no such warning. It was
> sent from Taiwan’s CDC to its WHO liaison officer on 31 December, hours
> after the first official report of a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan
> were published online.

> According to the text provided to the Guardian, the email said: “News
> resources today indicate that at least seven, atypical pneumonia cases were
> reported in China.”

> It restates the details of Chinese report, adding “I would greatly
> appreciate it if you have relevant information to share with us.”

> The email did not contain new information, and certainly nothing about
> human-to-human transmission. The WHO had picked up the same report on the
> night of 30 December and was urgently seeking more information. On 1 January
> it activated its incident management support team, putting the organisation
> on an emergency footing.

I feel like this whole "it said/it said" thing with all these various
organizations and their shifting messages is going to take years, at least, to
disentangle.

~~~
smileypete
Thanks for the update, I haven't looked at it for a while, these were my
bookmarked sources from that time:

[https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3904054](https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3904054)

[https://news.yahoo.com/taiwan-accuses-failing-heed-
warning-1...](https://news.yahoo.com/taiwan-accuses-failing-heed-
warning-143800176.html)

'The officials said doctors in Taiwan had learned from their colleagues in
mainland China that medical staff were falling ill from the as-yet unnamed
coronavirus, a sign of human-to-human transmission that Taiwan says it passed
on to the WHO and Chinese authorities on December 31. However, the WHO did not
communicate the information with other nations.'

So I guess it comes down to semantics; whether a mention of atypical cases and
request for confirmation is effectively a warning - or not.

Whatever the interpretation, it seems like the lack of response from the WHO
to that email indicates the WHO were in the dark at the time, or not willing
to share what they had. If the former then the email could be said to have
formed a warning of some kind.

>[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-in-a-
su...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-in-a-superpower-
struggle-the-inside-story-of-the-whos-response-to-coronavirus)

I love how The Guardian tries to twist the facts in the service of an anti
Trump screed. Personally I feel the report from Reuters was far more balanced
(it doesn't even mention Trump)

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-
taiwan...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-taiwan-
idUSKCN21T0BA)

(curious about the downvotes btw...)

------
nabaraz
This administration is using the WHO as a scapegoat for its mishandling of the
pandemic. But I am for increasing funding to NIH.gov instead of politics
ridden WHO. WHO has made this crisis worse with confusion, misinformation and
incompetence.

~~~
abeppu
But isn't the obvious domestic institution for public health crises/epidemics
the CDC, not the NIH? And hasn't the current administration interfered with
the CDC's response (including e.g. stopping them from doing their own regular
press briefings, removing a leading researcher after he expressed skepticism
in response to the president's comments on hydrochloroquine, etc)?

If your complaint is the crisis being made worse by confusion, misinformation
and incompetence, I hardly see how removing resources and trying to favor
hamstrung American institutions is an improvement.

------
surround
Mirror: [https://archive.is/c2Yb0](https://archive.is/c2Yb0)

------
hprotagonist
Withdrawal from the WHO takes at least a year.

which means that no, we haven't fully withdrawn from the WHO.

With luck and given the last 6+ months of polls, we have just added "unfuck
this, too" to the to-do list of the first two years of a new adminstration's
agenda.

------
jackfoxy
Bottom line: How is it the WHO did not declare a pandemic until Mar 11?

~~~
perl4ever
I don't know, but everybody panicked about the same time and came to the
conclusion it was a crisis right about on Friday the 13th. I personally was
worrying about why a lot of authorities were dragging their feet that week,
but none of them were the WHO.

Maybe take an inventory of where you were and what you were doing and thinking
that week?

~~~
ceejayoz
> I don't know, but everybody panicked about the same time and came to the
> conclusion it was a crisis right about on Friday the 13th.

The sudden switch was fascinating to me. One theory is Tom Hanks getting it
coupled with the NBA shutting down on the 11th turned it from abstract to very
concrete for a lot of folks:

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-12/tom-
hanks...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-12/tom-hanks-and-
the-nba-finally-wake-america-up-to-the-coronavirus)

~~~
perl4ever
Passing a threshold doesn't happen because something happened at exactly that
point; it happens because an accumulation of things reaches a tipping point.

For instance, with my workplace there were (unseen) negotiations with the
union on how to respond. For at least a week or more, us peons were saying (or
I was to myself) what the hell is the governor doing? Well, in all fairness,
lots of people were doing things behind the scenes.

~~~
ceejayoz
I'm saying "celebrities are getting hit now" pushed a lot of folks past that
tipping point.

If a random person wins the lottery, no one blinks an eye. If Tom Hanks and
the NBA win the lottery, people start wondering if a) it's more common than
they thought to win the lottery or b) the lottery is rigged, because
statistically celebs should have a low chance of winning it.

