The grim impossibility of addressing rising health emergencies with dwindling budgets was raised at the World Health Assembly (WHA) on Tuesday – amid votes on attacks on healthcare in Lebanon and Israel.

“Outbreaks are accelerating, while the systems designed to stop them are being weakened,” warned Dr Annette Heinzelmann, emergency director for the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMRO), during a discussion of health emergencies in Committee A.

“The gap between needs and resources is now unsustainable. The WHO Health Emergency Programme faced a $553 million funding gap in 2024 and 2025. The contingency fund for emergencies entered 2026 with just $19.5 million, while our regional emergency workforce has been cut by half. We cannot continue confronting expanding emergencies with shrinking capacity.”

In EMRO, 117 million people need humanitarian assistance; there are 14 graded emergencies, 44 active outbreaks, and more than 50 public health events across 17 member states. 

“Conflict, displacement, climate shock, economic collapse, and diseases are colliding into a single expanding poly crisis,” Heinzelmann warned, speaking on behalf of the regional director.

“Across Gaza, Sudan, Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan, and amid escalation affecting Iran, Syria, and Lebanon, WHO is sustaining trauma care, delivering medicines, reinforcing surveillance, and supporting governments to manage growing public health risks.”

Votes on Lebanon and Iran

Regional conflict is compounding the EMRO health crises. Lebanon received overwhelming support from the majority of member states in the wake of Israeli attacks on its health infrastructure – but there was little support for Iran’s appeal for support against similar attacks.

Ninety-five member states voted in favour of a resolution that noted “a health emergency in Lebanon resulting from ongoing and recently intensified hostilities” and called for “the full protection of healthcare in Lebanon, including patients, health personnel, facilities and transport”. 

Only Israel and Honduras opposed the resolution, which did not name Israel as the aggressor.

However, Iran’s resolution, condemning recent attacks on patients and health infrastructure, including on the Pasteur Institute  – was defeated. The resolution did not mention Israel and the United States as the aggressors.

Only 19 countries supported Iran, 30 voted against, and a whopping 58 countries abstained. Several countries cited Iran’s attacks against its own citizens and Gulf states, and the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, preventing the flow of medical supplies, as reasons for not supporting the resolution.

Haemorrhagic fever, extreme weather

Voting came at the end of a discussion on the WHO’s involvement in health emergencies in the WHA’s Committee A.

In 2025, WHO responded to 50 emergencies in 82 countries and territories, of which 20 were Grade 3 emergencies requiring the highest level of organisation-wide support, the organisation reported.

Disease outbreaks included viral haemorrhagic fever: Sudan virus disease in Uganda; Marburg in Tanzania and Ethiopia; Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rift Valley fever in Mauritania and Senegal. 

Mpox was declared a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC), affecting 98 countries, with 52 974 confirmed cases – 84% in Africa – and 215 deaths.

Thirty-three countries reported cholera outbreaks involving over 614 828 cases and 7,598 deaths. Angola, the DRC and Sudan had the highest cases.

The WHO provided over 58 million doses of “emergency vaccines” for cholera, meningitis, yellow fever and Ebola.

Challenges included “limited surveillance capacities and insufficient production of critical vaccines”.

Three out of four emergencies were either caused or exacerbated by extreme weather events such as flooding, droughts and cyclones.

Earthquakes in Afghanistan and Myanmar, severe Pacific typhoons and three category-5 hurricanes, including Hurricane Melissa, caused death and damage. The global cost of natural disasters is estimated at over $ 200 billion annually.

So great was the demand for WHO’s assistance that its Contingency Fund for Emergencies was left with $19.5 million by the end of the year.

Attacks on healthcare

Last year, the WHO verified 1,351 attacks on healthcare, resulting in 925 health facilities damaged or destroyed.

The Independent Oversight and Advisory Committee (IOAC) for the WHO Health Emergencies Programme reports a “significant and alarming escalation” in these attacks that are likely to “underestimate the true scale of the crisis as reporting is uneven”. 

EMRO’s Heinzelmann said that almost 40% of these attacks occurred in her region, accounting for almost 90% of related deaths. 

“Attacks on healthcare must stop, humanitarian access must be guaranteed, and financing for preparedness and emergency response must increase now, not after the next global crisis is already underway,” she urged.

Several member states, including Jordan, Switzerland, Australia, urged an end to attacks on health facilities and personnel and respect for international humanitarian law.

Lack of financing

The IOAC noted its deep concern at the “dramatic reductions in official development assistance from major donors”.

During the 2008 global economic recession, the WHO “deprioritised” its emergency-related teams and reduced the workforce – but paid a high price during the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, “which resulted in over 11,000 lives lost and posed an existential threat to WHO”, noted the IOAC.

“It is the IOAC’s responsibility to ensure that past weaknesses are not reprised and that WHO’s emergency capacities remain safeguarded.”

In the WHO’s 2026‒2027 budget, the base budget of the emergencies programme has been set at $918.5 million, with 51% for country offices, 22% for regional offices and 27% for headquarters.

Image Credits: Nour Alsaqqa/ MSF.