The World Health Organization has reduced its global headcount by about 221 people since January, down to 9,231 as compared to 9452 at the start of January – largely through a termination of temporary contracts and a freeze in renewals.  Most of the cutbacks have been at the Geneva Headquarters, WHO’s largest office, where 2,938 […] Continue reading ->
Low-income countries could confront the massive health finance crisis they are facing after the withdrawal of most US-based aid through a 50% increase in the price of tobacco, alcohol and sugary drinks – saving 50 million lives and raising some $1 trillion dollars in vital revenue for strapped health systems, says WHO. The ambitious WHO […] Continue reading ->
World Health Organization Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced his new team of 36 directors at headquarters on Tuesday, according to an internal message to WHO staff, seen by Health Policy Watch. Nine of the appointments, including key positions heading the Departments of Noncommunicable Diseases and Mental Health, and the newly-combined Department of Environment, […] Continue reading ->
A four year WHO-sponsored investigation of the origins of the COVID pandemic by an international group of experts has concluded that “most scientific data and accessible published scientific evidence” support the hypothesis that the novel SARS-CoV2 virus first entered the human population either directly from virus-carrying bats, or from bats to humans via intermediate hosts.   […] Continue reading ->
This story was updated to reflect new developments on Friday, 27 June.  Israel ordered a near-total halt to food and humanitarian aid deliveries to over two million Gazans facing a territory-wide threat of famine on Thursday after an AFP video surfaced showing dozens of armed men riding atop a convoy of flatbed trucks loaded with […] Continue reading ->
In an harsh reprimand at the global vaccine pledging summit Wednesday, US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. attacked Gavi’s record on vaccine safety and said the United States was halting support for the alliance, until it could “re-earn” the public trust. He charged that Gavi had stifled “free speech and legitimate […] Continue reading ->
The World Health Organization decried Thursday’s direct hit by Iran on one of Israel’s largest hospitals, Soroka Medical Center, which put the 1200-bed facility serving most of the country’s southern region largely out of operation.  In an X post, WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus also deplored the deaths of three Iranian Red Crescent […] Continue reading ->
Most countries’ climate action plans refer to the health benefits of adaptation and mitigation strategies, such as reduced air pollution, but few actually track them. And as World Environment Day is observed Thursday, global climate commitments remain extraordinarily weak.  Only 21 countries out of the 195 parties to the UN Paris Agreement have submitted updated […] Continue reading ->