The recent decision by the U.S. to withdraw the country from the World Health Organization is already undermining global efforts to eradicate polio, according to WHO officials.
“The disengagement of [the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] and [the U.S. Agency for International Development] is costing us already with the loss of their technical, strategic, and functional support,” Dr. Hanan Balkhy, regional director for WHO in the Eastern Mediterranean region, told member states last Friday during an executive board meeting session on polio.
When asked to elaborate, Dr. Hamid Jafari, director of polio eradication for WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean region, told Devex that the statement refers to the “curtailing of technical and strategic inputs by CDC in the overall polio eradication programme, withdrawal of CDC personnel from WHO offices, and the inability of the programme to access CDC’s global specialized poliovirus laboratory that serves as the nerve center for poliovirus testing and characterization and detection of polio outbreaks.”
About the author
Jenny Lei Ravelo@JennyLeiRavelo
Jenny Lei Ravelo is a Devex Senior Reporter based in Manila. She covers global health, with a particular focus on the World Health Organization, and other development and humanitarian aid trends in Asia Pacific. Prior to Devex, she wrote for ABS-CBN, one of the largest broadcasting networks in the Philippines, and was a copy editor for various international scientific journals. She received her journalism degree from the University of Santo Tomas.
