The World Health Organization (WHO) has proposed cutting its budget by a fifth following the decision of the United States, its largest contributor, to withdraw, and must now reduce its missions and staff, its director said in an internal email seen by AFP on Saturday.
The WHO faces a revenue shortfall of nearly $600 million by 2025 and has "no choice" but to start making cuts, the agency's director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, explained in a message sent to the UN health agency's staff on Friday.
In addition to triggering his country's withdrawal after taking office in January, President Donald Trump has decided to freeze virtually all U.S. foreign aid, including important programs aimed at improving global health.
The United States had already begun the process of leaving the WHO during Mr. Trump's first term in 2020.
He justified his decision in January by the discrepancy between American and Chinese financial contributions, accusing the organization of "scamming" his country.
As a result, Mr Tedros had already warned at the end of January that the WHO would take cost-cutting measures.
The United States was by far the largest contributor to the WHO's budget: over the last two-year budget cycle, for 2022-23, it provided $16.31 billion of the organization's total budget of $7.89 billion.
"Drastic cuts in official development assistance by the United States and other countries are causing enormous disruption to countries, NGOs, and UN agencies, including the WHO," Tedros said in his email.
Even before the US withdrawal process began, the WHO was already facing financial constraints and had begun working more than nine months ago on measures to improve its efficiency, its leader also noted.
But "the US announcement, combined with recent cuts in official development assistance from some countries to finance increased defense spending, has made our situation much more critical," Mr. Tedros explained.
"Although we have achieved substantial cost savings, current economic and geopolitical conditions make mobilizing resources particularly difficult," he wrote.
In February, the WHO executive board cut the proposed budget for 2026-2027 from $5.3 billion to $4.9 billion.
"Since then, the outlook for development aid has deteriorated," Tedros said. "So we have proposed to member states a further reduced budget of $4.2 billion, a decrease of $21 billion from the budget initially proposed."
The majority of US funding came from voluntary contributions for specific projects, rather than a fixed contribution.
"Despite all our efforts, we are now at the point where we have no choice but to reduce the scope of our work and our staff," concluded Mr. Tedros. He added: "These measures will apply initially at the headquarters level, starting with senior management, but will affect all levels and all regions."
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