Harvard professor suggests engaging WHO to fight ‘greatest global public health crisis in a century.’
As the coronavirus pandemic sweeping America spreads its tentacles, a leading Indian-American health expert has warned that US leaving the World Health organization (WHO) would have “dire consequences.”
“The US potentially leaving WHO has dire consequences for both global health and for the health and well-being of the American people,” Ashish K. Jha, Director, Harvard Global Health Institute, told a Senate panel Tuesday.
“WHO plays a critical role in providing support during health emergencies and accelerating scientific research. It is irreplaceable,” he said at a video hearing on covid-19 and US International Pandemic Preparedness, Prevention, and Response.
“During this pandemic, its response has been extraordinary, although not without some missteps,” noted Jha, who is also Professor of Global Health and Medicine at Harvard Medical School.
“Some of the urgent reform efforts laid out in the post-Ebola period have yet to be completed,” he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “But there is no substitute for WHO.”
“If we were to leave WHO, we would have no legitimacy or ability to make WHO a stronger organization,” Jha said, according to his written testimony.
“Instead, we should engage with WHO, support its important mission, and work to improve and strengthen it,” he suggested. “Our ability to beat this pandemic—and to improve the health of people in the US and around world —depends on it.”
“We are the middle of the greatest global public health crisis in a century,” Jha said noting, “The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on lives, healthcare systems, and economies around the globe.”
“In most countries around the world, cases and deaths are still rising, and an effective, widely deployed vaccine is likely at least a year away,” he said.
“Yet at this critical moment in global public health, US leadership is lacking,” Jha said citing Trump administration’s decision to withdraw the US from who as its “most striking example.”
“This is a decision that will harm not only the health of people around the world, but also US leadership and scientific prowess.”
“And ultimately, the withdrawal from WHO, if it is to be finalized, will harm the health of the American people at a time when Americans are getting sick and dying at an unprecedented rate,” Jha warned.
The warning came as confirmed cases in the US climbed to 2.69 million with a staggering 129,000 deaths to date.
Suggesting that “WHO has a unique and incomparable ability to coordinate and support international pandemic response,” he said,
“Now more than ever, we should be investing in and supporting this organization that is uniquely poised to tackle covid-19.”
The pandemic is still accelerating, Jha said noting, “We are continuing to see record-breaking daily increases in covid-19 cases, and deaths are also rising worldwide.”
“The pandemic is still in its early stages in most parts of the world, with cases still on their first uphill climb in Latin America, Africa, and large parts of Asia, as well as a resurgence of cases right here in the US.”
India for example, Jha said, “is now recording record numbers of single-day cases after easing the strict national lockdown that had been imposed. Reports of overwhelmed hospitals and lack of access to tests or treatment reveal the dire state of the pandemic there.”
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