US public health officials have been told to stop working with the World Health Organization (WHO), effective immediately, as the Trump administration prepares for the US withdrawal from the organisation.
A US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official, John Nkengasong, sent a memo to senior leaders at the agency on Sunday night telling them that all staff who work with the WHO must immediately stop their collaborations and “await further guidance”.
The Associated Press viewed a copy of Nkengasong’s memo, which said the stop-work policy applied to “all CDC staff engaging with WHO through technical working groups, coordinating centers, advisory boards, cooperative agreements or other means – in person or virtual”.
It also says CDC staff are not allowed to visit WHO offices.
Experts said the sudden stoppage was a surprise and would set back work on investigating and trying to stop outbreaks of Marburg virus and mpox in Africa, as well as brewing threats such as bird flu outbreaks.
“People thought there would be a slow withdrawal. This has really caught everyone with their pants down,” said Dr Jeffrey Klausner, a University of Southern California public health expert who collaborates with WHO on work against sexually transmitted infections.
Trump’s retreat from global health initiatives
It also comes as US President Donald Trump takes other steps to retreat from the global health sphere.
He has also reinstated the Mexico City Policy – which bans the US from funding foreign groups that perform or offer information on abortions – and frozen funding for PEPFAR (the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), which provides HIV medication to more than 20 million people.
