WHO launches new foundation for private donations
GENEVA: The World Health Organisation on Wednesday launched a new foundation for private donations, as US President Donald Trump threatens to pull the plug over its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The UN health agency launched the independentlyrun WHO Foundation, which the organisation hopes will give it greater control to direct philanthropic and public donations towards pressing problems such as the coronavirus crisis.
Trump, accusing the WHO of mismanaging the pandemic, has frozen US funding and could pull out of the organisation next month if he does not see what he believes to be satisfactory changes.
Trump claims the WHO is too close to Beijing and covered up the initial outbreak in China.
The vast majority of the WHO’s budget is in voluntary contributions which go straight from countries and other donors to their chosen destination.
The WHO therefore only has control over the spending of countries’ ‘assessed contributions’ membership fees, which are calculated on their wealth and population.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus launched the new foundation at the organisation’s headquarters in Geneva.
“One of the greatest threats to WHO’s success is the fact that less than 20 per cent of our budget comes in the form of flexible assessed contributions from member states, while over 80 per cent is voluntary contributions, which are usually tightly earmarked for specific programmes,” he said.
“There is a clear need to broaden our donor base, and to improve both the quantity and quality of funding we receive – meaning more flexibility.”
The new foundation will facilitate contributions from the general public, individual major donors and corporate partners to the WHO. Its goal is to help the organisation achieve more sustainable and predictable funding.
Given the ongoing coronavirus crisis, the WHO Foundation will focus initially on emergencies and pandemic response.
The novel coronavirus has infected at least 5.6 million people and killed more than 350,000 people since the outbreak first emerged in December, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP.