London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Monday, Sep 01, 2025

Donald Trump threatens to cut off WHO funding over agency’s handling of outbreak

Donald Trump threatens to cut off WHO funding over agency’s handling of outbreak

US president says World Health Organisation knew about the dangers of the coronavirus months before it took any action. The United States is the largest contributor to the 194-member UN body

President Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened to withhold US funding from the World Health Organisation, saying the United Nations body “missed the call” and implying it knew about the dangers of the coronavirus months before taking any action.

“We're going to put a hold on money sent to the WHO,” Trump said at the daily White House press briefing. “We're going to put a very powerful hold on it and we're going to see.”

“They could have called it months earlier,” he added. “They would have known, and they should have known, and they probably did know, so we'll be looking into that very carefully.”

Asked later in the briefing whether it was wise to cut the global health agency’s funding during a pandemic, Trump denied that a decision had been made.

“I’m not saying I’m going to do it, but we’re going to look at it,” Trump said. “We’re going to investigate it, we’re going to look at it, but we will look at ending funding.”



The WHO first noted “a pneumonia of unknown cause” in Wuhan in late December. It declared a global health emergency on January 30 and, on March 11, deemed the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic.

Trump had castigated the WHO on Twitter earlier in the day and issued a veiled threat against the 194-member agency, for whom the United States is the largest contributor.

“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 wrote on Twitter.

“Fortunately,” Trump wrote, “I rejected their advice on keeping our borders open to China early on. Why did they give us such a faulty recommendation?”

This was not the first time Trump took issue with the agency’s funding. The White House’s proposed budget for 2021 cuts the US contribution to the organisation significantly, from US$122 million to under US$58 million, though the final decision belongs to Congress.

The WHO has emerged as a popular target of criticism on the right, with conservatives claiming it had relied heavily on potentially suspect data from China in formulating its guidance around the disease.

As late as January 31, WHO representatives were advising countries to keep their borders open even as the virus spread. That same day the Trump administration announced restrictions on some travellers from China.

At that time, the WHO was providing guidance that “travel bans to affected areas or denial of entry to passengers coming from affected areas are usually not effective in preventing the importation” and could “have a significant economic and social impact”.



The agency warned that strictly limiting movement during a pandemic could “interrupt needed aid and technical support” and “disrupt businesses”, although it did allow that if restrictions were “short in duration” they may “may have a public health rationale at the beginning of the containment phase of an outbreak”.

Trump’s ban went far beyond WHO advice, but was also poorly enforced.

The New York Times has found that at least 430,000 people arrived in the United States on direct flights from China even after Trump announced his travel restrictions, and that screening protocols of travellers from China were spotty.

There is also evidence that the White House’s fraught relationship with the WHO exacerbated the United States’ failure to roll out widespread effective testing for the virus.

While the UN was vital in shoring up testing in many countries, the United States refused to use the international body’s testing kits, subsequently scrambling to develop its own. Testing shortages continue to hobble the US’ response to the virus.



The chorus of WHO criticism from the US right wing has recently swelled.

On Monday, Senator Rick Scott, Republican of Florida, said Fox News that the “WHO should be held accountable for helping Communist China lie about the coronavirus.”

Last week, Senator Marco Rubio, also a Florida Republican, put out a statement condemning the “WHO’s current leadership, who have regularly demonstrated their servility to the Chinese Communist Party”.

Rubio called for the resignation of WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, saying that he is “either complicit or dangerously incompetent. Neither possibility bodes well for his future at the helm of this critical organization.”

The agency came under fire recently when a video emerged of a WHO adviser first pretending not to hear the question, then cutting an interview short when asked about Taiwan.

“When people’s lives were at stake, Taiwan acted to protect them,” said Rubio. “That is exactly what the WHO should be doing; instead, it has undermined global health by carrying water for Beijing.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
WhatsApp is rolling out a feature that looks a lot like Telegram.
Investigations Reveal Rise in ‘Sex-for-Rent’ Listings Across Canada Exploiting Vulnerable Tenants
Chinese and Indian Leaders Pursue Amity Amid Global Shifts
European Union Plans for Ukraine Deployment
ECB Warns Against Inflation Complacency
Concerns Over North Cyprus Casino Development
Shipping Companies Look Beyond Chinese Finance
Rural Exodus Fueling European Wildfires
China Hosts Major Security Meeting
Chinese Police Successfully Recover Family's Savings from Livestream Purchases
Germany Marks a Decade Since Migrant Wave with Divisions, Success Stories, and Political Shifts
Liverpool Defeat Arsenal 1–0 with Szoboszlai Free-Kick to Stay Top of Premier League
Prince Harry and King Charles to Meet in First Reunion After 20 Months
Chinese Stock Market Rally Fueled by Domestic Investors
Israeli Airstrike in Yemen Kills Houthi Prime Minister
Ukrainian Nationalist Politician Andriy Parubiy Assassinated in Lviv
Corporate America Cuts Middle Management as Bosses Take On Triple the Workload
Parents Sue OpenAI After Teen’s Death, Alleging ChatGPT Encouraged Suicide
Amazon Faces Lawsuit Over 'Buy' Label on Digital Streaming Content
Federal Reserve Independence Questioned Amid Trump’s Push to Reshape Central Bank
British Politics Faces Tumultuous Autumn After Summer of Rebellions and Rising Farage Momentum
US Appeals Court Rules Against Most Trump-Era Tariffs
UK Sought Broad Access to Apple Users’ Data, Court Filing Reveals
UK Bank Shares Dive Over Potential Tax on Sector
Germany’s Auto Industry Sheds 51,500 Jobs in First Half of 2025 Amid Deepening Crisis
Bruce Willis Relocated Due to Advanced Dementia
French and Korean Nuclear Majors Clash As EU Launches Foreign Subsidy Probe
EU Stands Firm on Digital Rules as Trump Warns of Retaliation
Getting Ready for the 3rd Time in Its History, Germany Approves Voluntary Military Service for Teenagers
Argentine President Javier Milei Evacuated After Stones Thrown During Campaign Event
Denmark Confronts U.S. Diplomat Over Covert Trump-Linked Influence in Greenland
Starmer Should Back Away from ECHR, Says Jack Straw
Trump Demands RICO Charges Against George Soros and Son for Funding Violent Protests
Taylor Swift Announces Engagement to NFL Star Travis Kelce
France May Need IMF Bailout, Warns Finance Minister
Chinese AI Chipmaker Cambricon Posts Record Profit as Beijing Pushes Pivot from Nvidia
After the Shock of Defeat, Iranians Yearn for Change
Ukraine Finally Allows Young Men Aged Eighteen to Twenty-Two to Leave the Country
The Porn Remains, Privacy Disappears: How Britain Broke the Internet in Ten Days
YouTube Altered Content by Artificial Intelligence – Without Permission
Welcome to The Definition of Insanity: Germany Edition
Just a reminder, this is Michael Jackson's daughter, Paris.
Spotify’s Strange Move: The Feature Nobody Asked For – Returns
Manhunt in Australia: Armed Anti-Government Suspect Kills Police Officers Sent to Arrest Him
China Launches World’s Most Powerful Neutrino Detector
How Beijing-Linked Networks Shape Elections in New York City
Ukrainian Refugee Iryna Zarutska Fled War To US, Stabbed To Death
Elon Musk Sues Apple and OpenAI Over Alleged App Store Monopoly
2 Australian Police Shot Dead In Encounter In Rural Victoria State
Vietnam Evacuates Hundreds of Thousands as Typhoon Kajiki Strikes; China’s Sanya Shuts Down
×