The White House is preparing options for President Trump to cut financial support for the World Health Organization over the group’s response to the novel coronavirus.
Officials within the Trump administration are considering two pathways for cutting funding to the WHO, including redirecting funds toward other public health groups with similar goals or proposing a financial package to Congress that revokes funds already allocated. According to Axios, the president is most likely to consider repurposing funds for other health groups.
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“We’re not anticipating doing that action with Congress not being around,” an official told the outlet. “We’re looking for action that can be done very quickly.”
A senior administration official confirmed to the Washington Examiner on Tuesday that the Office of Management and Budget “has been working to provide options for stopping the funds.” The person added that the president will make a final decision this week.
Last week, Trump chided the WHO for giving “faulty recommendations” as to how the United States should respond to the coronavirus pandemic, calling them “China centric” and threatening to slash funding.
“The W.H.O. really blew it. For some reason, funded largely by the United States, yet very China centric. We will be giving that a good look,” Trump said. “Fortunately I rejected their advice on keeping our borders open to China early on. Why did they give us such a faulty recommendation?”
In January, the Trump administration imposed travel restrictions on China following reports of the coronavirus oubreak, despite ardent opposition from the WHO. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the action helped mitigation efforts in the U.S.
WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has repeatedly praised China’s efforts to contain the virus, including after meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in late January.
“Stopping the spread of this virus both in China and globally is WHO’s highest priority,” Tedros said. “We appreciate the seriousness with which China is taking this outbreak, especially the commitment from top leadership, and the transparency they have demonstrated, including sharing data and genetic sequence of the virus.”
In early 2020, members of the U.S. intelligence community reportedly informed Trump that China, believed to be the coronavirus’s place of origin, was lying about the seriousness of the virus, which has since infected more than 1.9 million people worldwide. Officials informed the president that China “appeared to be minimizing the severity of the outbreak” and was “not being candid about the true scale of the crisis.”
Evidence has indicated China also misled the WHO about the severity of COVID-19 to prevent investigations in Wuhan, where the first case of the coronavirus was reported, and blocked foreign medical health experts from assisting the containment of the disease. One study indicated that if China hadn’t misled the world about the virus’s severity, the coronavirus would have been significantly less widespread.
