W.H.O. Adopts Pandemic Treaty, Expanding Its Power over Disease Management Worldwide

The World Health Assembly, the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) body made up of its state members, formally adopted the Pandemic Agreement on Tuesday, an international legal document that commits signatories to sharing medical technology, expanding vaccination campaigns, and promoting “equity.”

The highly controversial Pandemic Agreement — at one point referred to as the “W.H.O. convention, agreement, or other international instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response” because drafting parties could not agree on what it was — was conceived of as a binding document first discussed in 2021 to address the W.H.O.’s disastrous response to the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. The W.H.O. worked closely with the Communist Party of China during the early days of the pandemic, opposing limits of countries welcoming Chinese travelers from affected areas, denying that the highly contagious pathogen spread from human to human, and ignoring a critical early warning from the government of Taiwan that a novel infectious disease was spreading in Wuhan in 2019.

The Wuhan coronavirus went on to kill over 7 million people globally.

W.H.O. Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has blamed the United Nations agency’s failures largely on claims that it was not sufficiently empowered to act to contain the virus. Tedros has also blamed economic inequality for the large death rate, suggesting that nations at the forefront of developing medical technology, primarily the United States, must restrain their intellectual property laws during medical emergencies to allow for the inexpensive and rapid global distribution of vaccines, therapeutics, and other medical products. The Pandemic Agreement addresses these concerns by establishing a Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing system (PABS) to share both medical developments and newly discovered information on the pathogens involved, expanding the pool of scientists able to work on solutions.

The final version of the document, completed in April, passed the World Health Assembly with 124 votes. Reuters reported that 11 nations abstained, notably including Iran, Israel, and Russia. Some of the most vocal opponents of the agreement, including America and Argentina, were not present, as they have withdrawn from the W.H.O.

The April version of the Pandemic Agreement begins with a call to adopt “equity as a goal, principle, and outcome of pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response” and makes reference to alleged climate change and other left-wing causes.

It commits signatories to “promote and otherwise facilitate or incentivize, transfer of technology,” particularly following any W.H.O. declaration of a pandemic, calling for a creation of a system to streamline that transfer.

“Each participating manufacturer shall make available to the World Health Organization, pursuant to legally binding contracts signed with the World Health Organization,” the text reads, “rapid access targeting 20% of their real time production of safe, quality, and effective vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics for the pathogen causing the pandemic emergency.”

The W.H.O. will then distribute that supply “on the basis of public health risk and need, with particular attention to the needs of developing countries.”

The agreement also commands that state parties change their laws to conform to the W.H.O.’s document: “Each Party should review and consider amending, as appropriate, its national and/or domestic legislation with a view to ensuring that it is able to implement this Article in a timely and effective manner.”

Parties must also agree to improve “laboratory biological risk management,” an apparent nod to a mounting evidence that a biological laboratory leak may have been the origin of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic. The W.H.O. had initially dismissed the laboratory leak theory without explanation after a Chinese regime-controlled “investigation” of Wuhan in 2021.

Withdrawing from the Pandemic Agreement for regretful countries will take three years; signatories must have adopted the agreement for two years before submitting a withdrawal request, and that request will go into vigor a year after being officially received.

The passage of the Pandemic Agreement does not make it viable law. For its provisions to take effect, it must have state party signatories. The W.H.O. explained in its announcement of its passage that, following the building of its technology and intelligence sharing systems, it will soon be open for signing. Countries that are not signatories to the agreement are not bound by it as international law.

“The resolution on the WHO Pandemic Agreement adopted by the World Health Assembly sets out steps to prepare for the accord’s implementation,” the agency explained. “It includes launching a process to draft and negotiate a Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing system (PABS) through an Intergovernmental Working Group (IGWG). The result of this process will be considered at next year’s World Health Assembly.”

Signatories will not be bound by the agreement until 60 countries sign onto it.

Tedros nonetheless effusively celebrated the formalizing of the agreement as a historic achievement for the world.

“The world is safer today thanks to the leadership, collaboration and commitment of our Member States to adopt the historic WHO Pandemic Agreement,” Tedros claimed. “The Agreement is a victory for public health, science, and multilateral action. It will ensure we, collectively, can better protect the world from future pandemic threats.”

“It is also a recognition by the international community that our citizens, societies, and economies must not be left vulnerable to again suffer losses like those endured during [the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic],” he added.

The establishment of a pandemic treaty has been met with great suspicion worldwide that such a document would erode the sovereignty of signatory states, giving the W.H.O. undue authority over public health policies.

Tedros has repeatedly addressed those concerns by calling them “misinformation” and implying that large numbers of people would die if the document were not adopted.

“Far from ceding sovereignty, the agreement actually affirms national sovereignty and national responsibility in its foundational principles. Indeed, the agreement is itself an exercise of sovereignty,” he claimed in February 2024.

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