Good riddance to the World Health Organization, or more accurately, the Woke Health Oligarchy — since it’s a network of self-styled, anti-American scientists and diplomats determined to use the United States as its piggybank.
On Day 1, when President Trump announced he was withdrawing the country from WHO, scientists from universities and think tanks sounded the alarm, falsely claiming Trump’s move will isolate the United States from worldwide efforts to detect and limit deadly diseases.
Trump must be feeling the pressure. He suggested on Saturday that he might reconsider and try to clean up WHO instead.
Stick to you guns, Mr. President. WHO’s record is a disgrace.
WHO was founded to create an international method of sharing data and fighting disease.
But when it faced its biggest test — the virus emanating from China in the winter of 2019-2020 — it proved to be a puppet of the Chinese Communist Party.
WHO pandered to Beijing, colluding to keep the disease a secret and likely increasing the death toll by millions.
As Elise Stefanik, Trump’s nominee for UN ambassador, told Congress Tuesday, “We cannot tolerate entities that are taken over by CCP propaganda.”
Roll the tape.
Lie No. 1: In December 2019 and January and February 2020, while Chinese officials were arresting locals for discussing the Wuhan virus and censoring information flowing out of the country, WHO’s director general, Dr. Tedros Ghebreyesus, heaped praise on the Chinese for their “openness to sharing information” and falsely claimed that “China has bought the world time.”
Lie No. 2: Ghebreyesus kowtowed to China and delayed declaring COVID-19 an international health emergency until February 2020, after it had spread to 18 countries.
Lie No. 3: The WHO promised an investigation into the virus’ origins but let China block WHO investigators from talking to Chinese scientists or disease victims or even examining patient data.
The initial report of this charade investigation called a lab leak extremely unlikely.
The scientific establishment ignores these lies and paints a glowing picture of WHO, insisting the United States will be less safe. Ridiculous. Relying on WHO’s lies made us all less safe.
Many scientists, including WHO’s biggest advocate, Anthony Fauci, also back the group’s ongoing push for a global pandemic treaty.
That treaty proposal is a confiscatory piece of mischief that would oblige the United States to hand over a whopping 20% of medical supplies to WHO in the event of a global crisis.
All for the sake of equity.
WHO — meaning China — would decide which countries get the supplies, and prevent Washington from prioritizing Americans needs.
Typical of globalist thinking, Harvard health expert Jesse Bump says the treaty is designed to correct “the shameful and selfish actions of rich countries in the COVID pandemic.”
Exiting WHO is good a first step, but the Trump administration also needs to clean house at the federal health agencies, replacing the globalist bias that has caused these agencies to squander billions in other parts of the world while falling short on protecting Americans.
President Barack Obama and his CDC director, Thomas Frieden, launched the America Last philosophy. Obama committed billions to building labs and disease surveillance throughout Africa, while US health departments went without those resources.
When Zika struck in 2016, Frieden allocated staff and funding for mosquito control in South America but refused to help local US health departments, insisting mosquito control was a local responsibility.
Tell that to a mother facing the heartache of a brain-damaged baby.
During Trump’s first term, little attention was paid to the impact of globalism on health.
Then COVID-19 shined a bright light on American public-health inadequacies.
Even now, the CDC has over 1,600 employees on the payroll working in 60 countries.
David Weldon, Trump’s nominee to head the CDC, needs to assure the public that the CDC will prioritize American health.
Finally, no matter what possibly criminal steps Fauci, NIH head Francis Collins and Ecohealth Alliance CEO Peter Daszak may have taken after the pandemic struck to cover up their funding gain-of-function research in Wuhan, the fact that they initially thought it was acceptable to send American dollars to pay for lethal research at a lab that works for the Chinese Communist Party shows the danger of globalist thinking.
Globalists don’t think countries matter. One is as good as another.
That attitude endangers American health and national security.
Let’s hope the days of putting globalism ahead of loyalty to the United States are over.
Betsy McCaughey is chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths and a former lieutenant governor of New York.