Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced that the United States rejected the United Nations Political Declaration on Non-Communicable Diseases.
“The United Nations General Assembly’s approach is misdirected,” Kennedy said, describing the global health crises posed by noncommunicable diseases. “It attempts both too much and too little. It exceeds the UN’s proper role while ignoring some of the most pressing health issues.”
“A sound global health policy must respect families and cultures and communities,” Kennedy explained. “It must be practical, cost-effective, and locally driven. More specifically, we cannot accept language that pushes destructive gender ideology.”
“We cannot accept claims of a constitutional or international right to abortion,” he added, going on to assert that the United States “cannot cede authority to the World Health Organization. The WHO’s failure during COVID cost the world valuable time and countless lives.”
Until the WHO undergoes reform, Kennedy said, it “cannot claim credibility or leadership.”
Despite U.S. opposition, the WHO said that world leaders have “expressed overwhelming support for the text of the first United Nations global political declaration on responding to noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) and mental health in an integrated manner.”
The declaration will be considered for final approval in October.
In July, Kennedy, alongside Secretary of State Marco Rubio, rejected the WHO’s proposed International Health Regulations (IHR).
Kennedy said the proposed amendments “open the door to the kind of narrative management, propaganda, and censorship that we saw during the COVID pandemic,” emphasizing that the United States can “cooperate with other nations without jeopardizing our civil liberties, without undermining our Constitution, and without ceding away America’s treasured sovereignty.”
