On January 20, 2025, among the flurry of executive orders signed on his first day in office, Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the World Health Organization. He had tried to do this during his first term in July 2020 — during the COVID-19 pandemic — but Biden reversed the withdrawal upon taking office. This time, with a full four-year term ahead, the withdrawal was designed to stick.
What the U.S. Funded
The United States was the single largest contributor to the WHO, providing over $700 million annually in assessed and voluntary contributions. That funding supported disease surveillance in over 150 countries, vaccine distribution programs, polio eradication efforts, maternal health initiatives, and the global early warning system for pandemic threats. The U.S. didn’t just participate in the WHO — it anchored it.
The withdrawal was signed during an active H5N1 avian influenza outbreak. Bird flu had been detected in U.S. dairy herds, with cases in multiple states and confirmed human infections among farmworkers. The WHO was coordinating the international surveillance response. The U.S. pulled out of the coordination structure while the outbreak was ongoing. No alternative surveillance system was proposed.
What Was Lost
Disease doesn’t respect borders. The WHO serves as the world’s early warning system for outbreaks that could become pandemics. U.S. participation gave American scientists access to global surveillance data, outbreak reports, and coordination mechanisms. Without it, the U.S. loses visibility into emerging threats in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East — exactly the regions where the next pandemic is most likely to originate.
The withdrawal also affected ongoing programs: polio eradication in the final stretch, tuberculosis treatment in developing countries, and maternal health initiatives that served millions. These programs didn’t stop, but they lost their largest funder.
Bottom Line
The WHO is imperfect. Its response to COVID was flawed. Reform is needed. But withdrawing entirely — pulling $700 million in funding, losing access to global surveillance, abandoning coordination structures — during an active outbreak with pandemic potential — is not reform. It’s abdication. The next pandemic will not check whether the U.S. has a WHO membership before it arrives. When it comes, the early warning systems the U.S. helped build and then abandoned will be the systems we wish we still had access to. That’s not speculation. That’s epidemiology.
Sources
- White House: Executive order withdrawing from WHO, January 20, 2025.
- Associated Press: WHO withdrawal details and global health impact analysis.
- WHO: U.S. funding contributions and program impact data.