The World Health Organization is continuing to beat the drum for a global alliance to combat the next pandemic. Its critics, in response, continue to beat their own drum for what many see as a shameless power grab that threatens the sovereignty of nations and advances leftist policies far beyond the name of health and wellness.
What the WHO is calling its "Pandemic Preparedness Agreement" would grant the WHO broad authority to issue vaccine and mask mandates, call for lockdowns, travel restrictions and more when met with a world health emergency that it would have power to declare.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the WHO acted in an advisory capacity. Amendments to the International Health Regulations, which the WHO is currently attempting to pass, would make the U.S. and 190 other countries legally bound to accept their directives.
WHO Secretary General Tedro Ghebreyesus continued to beat the drum for the agreement at a meeting of the WHO's negotiating body in Geneva on Monday.
"If we miss this opportunity, we risk losing momentum. More importantly, we risk leaving the world exposed to the same shortcomings that hampered the global response to COVID 19 – a lack of coordination, a lack of sharing information and the lack of equity," he said.
Interesting take on 'essential healthcare'
The agreement would also give the WHO authority to advance abortion with few if any restrictions under the guise of "essential healthcare." The WHO could also combat the spread of what it would define as "disinformation."
Frank Gaffney, Jr., is founder and executive chairman of the Center for Security Policy. He was a guest on Washington Watch Monday.
"If you liked what the World Health Organization did in an advisory role during the pandemic, you're going to love what it will be able to do when it can compel you to do various things – among them, being denied information about the best kind of medical treatment for whatever problem we may be facing at the time," Gaffney warned.
WHO, the medical and health arm of the United Nations, was roundly criticized for its COVID-19 response in a 2021 report by an independent panel which the WHO itself authorized. The panel concluded the WHO should have declared a global response earlier than it did and cited a "myriad of failures, gaps and delays in preparedness and response."
According to Gaffney, "all of this flows from the idea that somehow an agency that proved to be terribly corrupt and incompetent in that pandemic experience should be made more powerful to the point where the World Health Organization will be the arbiter of when and how any nation in the world, including ours, has a public health emergency and what must be done about it."
Gaffney minced no words. "This is totally unconstitutional in our country, an affront to our sovereignty, for sure, but also, a threat to your personal medical freedom. It's unconscionable, and it must be stopped," he told show host Tony Perkins.
Ghebreyesus is working to get enough support from member nations to pass the Pandemic Preparedness Agreement at WHO's general assembly in May.
Last September the U.S. voted in favor of the measure. The list of 11 dissenters included Russia, Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, North Korea, Eritrea, Iran, Nicaragua, Syria, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.
Former U.S. Rep. Michele Bachman told Washington Watch last fall that the agreement would give the WHO an open door to advance radical social policies.
"They have redefined health care to include climate change, racism, abortion, income inequality, LGBTQ issues, everything," Bachmann warned. "It sounds far out but that's why we say we aren't far out from creating a platform for global governance."
Americans ignorant to what awaits them?
Gaffney said most Americans don't fully appreciate the "China model" to which they will be subjected if the U.S. goes along with the agreement.
"This is basically the product of what was called in the pandemic 'the China model,'" he explained.
"What does that mean? That means the things like mask mandates, social distancing, lockdowns, mandatory vaccinations, vaccinations – including with inadequately tested treatments of various kinds – and a digital gulag that will essentially compel you to conform.
"Did anybody like that during the last exercise? Heavens no – but they don't know that this is going to be compelled upon them in the future," he said.
