WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reiterated his calls for a global pandemic agreement on Monday.
Ghebreyesus said during his opening remarks at the thirteenth meeting with the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body that the world has reached a “crucial point” to finalize the Pandemic Agreement ahead of the World Health Assembly.
“It really is a case of now or never. But I am confident that you will choose now, because you know what is at stake,” he said. “You remember the hard-won lessons of COVID-19, which left an estimated 20 million of our brothers and sisters dead, and which continues to kill.”
“They are why we are here: to protect future generations from the impact of future pandemics,” the WHO leader stated. “Because we know that the next pandemic is a matter of when, not if.”
Ghebreyesus declared, “Prevention is the responsibility of all countries; Preparedness is the responsibility of all countries; And response is the responsibility of all countries.”
Last year, the WHO chief called for a pandemic treaty in response to an unknown “Disease X.”
“The pandemic agreement can bring all the experience, all the challenges that we have faced and all the solutions into one,” he said at the time. “That agreement can help us to prepare for the future in a better way.”
President Donald Trump previously called the WHO a “corrupt globalist scam.”
“The World Health Organization has become nothing more than a corrupt globalist scam paid for by the United States but owned and controlled by China,” Trump said in a 2023 video statement on Truth Social. “When the China virus reached our shores three years ago, the World Health Organization disgracefully covered the tracks of the Chinese Communist Party — every single step of the way. For this reason, it was my great honor to terminate America’s relationship with the World Health Organization.”
He explained that then-President Joe Biden pushed to “bypass the United States Senate to enter a pandemic treaty that would surrender American sovereignty to the World Health Organization. Again, controlled by China.”
Trump withdrew the United States from the WHO on January 20.
