Talk:World Health Organization/Archive 1

Archive 1

List of WHO Representatives

I think a topic should be added, who agrees?--Eshcorp 09:36, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Inclusion in Category:Pro-choice organizations

Category:Pro-life organizations includes the following description:

The following is a list of organizations that call themselves pro-life, or support this cause.

I added a similar description to Category:Pro-choice organizations to be consistent:

The following is a list of organizations that call themselves pro-choice, or support this cause.

The WHO fits this description. WHO does not have to have pro-choice or anything similar in its name in order to promote or support abortion rights, which it does. Severa keeps removing it from the WikiProject Abortion. I think it belongs there. Thoughts, anyone? MamaGeek (Talk/Contrib) 15:19, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Please see my rationale at the WikiProject Abortion talk page. Input in helping to better define the criteria used for project categorization and/or inclusion would be appreciated. -Severa (!!!) 16:17, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

The WHO, being a multi-lateral organization, must uphold health and healthcare standards that suit the needs of the majority of the people within its member states. It happens to be that the cause of pro-lifers is pretty well represented in the world; so much so, that often, in many countries, there are quite heart-rending and devastating abortion practices, that put the mother at risk. WHO people are doctors, they have to save lives, and more importantly here, prevent the majority of people from dying. If that means informing people on the availability of safe abortions, that just seems logical, and not particularly pro-choice.Themalau 13:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Funding controversy

Removed this inaccurate and misleading section:

Funding Controversy

Daphne Fresle, a former top official in the WHO office that monitors worldwide pharmaceutical use, resigned in protest in 2002, complaining of the agency's relationships with drug makers. She said WHO higher-ups routinely censored internal disagreements among staff members over drug-company influence on the agency.

This section was presumably based on an inaccurate and misleading June 26, 2005 Seattle Times article, New blood-pressure guidelines pay off — for drug companies that said:

In the 1980s, the agency turned its attention to noncommunicable diseases. But its ability to do meaningful work was limited by a budget that had been frozen at $450 million.

That's where drug companies stepped in.

The WHO solicits tens of millions of dollars yearly from companies whose fortunes it directly affects. In fact, the international agency now takes in more private money — more than $500 million a year — than it gets in dues from its 192 member nations.

Daphne Fresle, a former top official in the WHO office that monitors worldwide pharmaceutical use, resigned in protest in 2002, complaining of the agency's relationships with drug makers. She said WHO higher-ups routinely censored internal disagreements among staff members over drug-company influence on the agency.

The article inaccurately and misleadingly says the WHO gets most of its funding from private sources, and by implication from drug companies. It does not. Since assessed contributions (dues) have long been frozen, voluntary contributions now provide over half of the WHO's funding, primarily from national and local governments, foundations and NGOs, and other UN organizations, with very little coming from private sources (drug companies and others).[1][2]

The Dec 23, 2001, six-page resignation letter by Daphne Fresle, a member of the WHO essential drugs and medicines policy group, was described in more detail in a May 4, 2002 article by Lancet editor Richard Horton.PMID 12047986 It was not protesting pharmaceutical companies contributing too much to funding of the WHO. 69.208.181.183 00:41, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

'Repairs'

The beginning sector of this page is in need of 'repairs'. The image doesn't show, the disambiguation link doesn't work and a lot of other sectors don't show. I'm no expert so a little bit of volunteering would help. Dorkules 16:16, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

World Health Report

The "criticism" in this section from an opinion piece violates WP:RS and WP:UNDUE. Firstly, it is an opinion piece from someone who is not an expert on the WHO, the health report or even health policy. Secondly, the amount of space given to it matches the actual description of the report. I am removing this section. If a section wants to be included about criticism, it should have genuine secondary sources that describe the world health report being criticised for x and y. Not chunks of quotation from opinion pieces. Recurring dreams 14:02, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Liechtenstein

Why isn't Liechtenstein a member? -Tim Rhymeless (Er...let's shimmy) 06:14, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Has Montenegro been admited? - Privacy 20:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Montenegro yes; Liechtenstein - it is not on the official members list, so it appears to be a non-member, but I don't know why so... Alinor 06:18, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

It's most likely represented by switzerland 4.142.126.242 18:28, 13 September 2007 (UTC)eric

Directors General order

The first director general is listed at the top, but the incumbent is listed at the bottom.Htmlqawsedrftg (talk) 02:29, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Operation Cat Drop

is there anymore information on this as it sounds fascinating —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.87.70.232 (talk) 08:29, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Summary of Activities

Opinionated and reads like PR. --Sabrown100 (talk) 00:25, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Smoking Controversy

I removed an expert tag that was inserted along with a claim that the WHO's policy on not hiring smokers is discriminatory as it was obvious POV. I did not remove the content. I am uncertain what expert help was being looked for and I do not know that this should continue to be listed under controversies, but left it to others more intimately familiar with the WHO. Cheers and happy editing, Into The Fray ^T/C 05:04, 27 September 2007 (UTC) Not hiring smokers is by very deffinition discriminatory and the downsides should be mentioned but only if given a decent source. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.31.180.132 (talk) 02:11, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

One little known activity

• Peace of Mind: The Silent Soul Bides its Time by Manoj Das. Here Manoj Das says: "In 1984, the WHO asked India's director-general of health services to discuss the possibility of a hidden fourth dimension of the human, from the physical and mental health point of view, in a workshop consisting of some of India's leading physicians, psychologists, psychiatrists, neuro-scientists and students of mysticism, at NIMHANS, Bangalore. The brainstorming sessions concluded that it was time for medical and psychological healthcare disciplines to take note of Factor X, the unpronounced potency, the foundation of our life.2

I've never heard about that until now, and I'd like to read a report on the results of the workshop. Maybe something can be found with the help of NIMHANS (?).

Austerlitz -- 88.75.71.237 (talk) 14:10, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Household Water Treatment and Safe Storage (HWTS) program

In the near future I am planning to add the HWTS to the list of programs and then add an article about it. --Tal Bee (talk) 16:50, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Namebox

Do we really need all these names in foreign languages within the namebox? As per United Nations, there should only be the official names given in the working languages of the UN (English, Chinese, Russian, etc.) and I barely consider Italian and Korean to be UN working languages. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 10:39, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

i agree - i think it's really superfluous, and if people don't provide some reason to provide non-UN languages, we should take them out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.161.58.106 (talk) 01:31, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I too agree, and I have edited the page. — Guillaume Pelletier ~ 01:17, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Controversy section

This section is poorly sourced (references are to campaign movies, websites, and blogs) and does not assert notability, and is decidedly one-sided. It is also disproportionately large considering the rest of the article. I think this section is of quite minor relevance to the article and the WHO itself, so should be removed. --147.171.255.159 (talk) 11:55, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe someone is willing and interested to have a look on the German contribution for explaining WHO criticism and to translate it to English. I am not the one. My thesaurus of legal termini is quite small. After reading the article about the relations between the IAEO and the WHO in the newspaper Le Monde Diplomatique I worked out this short review on the original agreement which is causing the criticism that possibilities of world-wide health education regarding any nuclear technologies is limited effectively. Secondary ressources like this newspaper itself were not accepted even with the literature ressources which are used within this articles!--84.56.209.22 23:43, 15. Oct., 2008 (CET) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.56.241.55 (talk) 22:42, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

There is a permanent protest in front of the WHO headquarters for the last 2 years, so it is a minor issue. There are numerous reports that the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster are not properly addressed by WHO, although these reports are obviously not from the establishment. Many references are provided to this section. Yann (talk) 13:50, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The claim that the WHO was gagged by the IAEA is obviously made by people who haven't actually read the agreement or any of the other agreements the WHO made, I've fixed that section.

211.27.74.147 (talk) 11:58, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Dear 211.27.74.147, your text on the WHO/IAEA is biased and contains your personal opinions ('erroneously'), which nobody really required. In particular, it did not clarify why the controversy arose as you usefully forgot to quote the key paragraph 3 of article 1. Hopefully, my text will do a better job at presenting the controversy without the bias.--Gigoachef (talk) 14:30, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

During the 1980s wasn't Homosexuality a disease as far as the WHO were concerned? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.200.130.2 (talk) 16:19, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Editing notes

I did some editing with more references + inline citations, including moving some unsubstantiated claims to the "controversies" section and clearly pointing out some places where references were still needed.Guptan99 (talk) 18:34, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

191 or another number of representatives?

"Members of the WHO are 191 of the UN members, the Cook Islands and Niue." While list of sovereign states says "The internationally recognized sovereign states section lists all 193 widely recognised sovereign states, including all member states of the United Nations, plus Vatican City". I ask:

• UN has 191 or 192 members?
• Cook Islands and Niue are really sovereign? o_O

It's not my cup of tea but I think that looks like a problem to me... Vinne2 (talk) 20:02, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Why is Cuba not colored on the map? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.204.8.39 (talk) 16:19, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Authority and mandate

The lede had described WHO as having authority and a "mandate", as if someone had put them in charge. This is the POV of those who feel that the UN ought to be a world government or function as one; or that it already is doing so. That POV is opposed by those who see it as doing some valuable work in coordinating national initiatives, but who don't recognize it is authoritative in any way.

Let's find a way to avoid exalting either of these viewpoints in the article. Either mention both, or ignore both. Considering that the 1st POV is not mentioned anywhere but the lede, I've opted for ignoring both - for now.

On the other hand, WHO is very influential in terms of rich countries giving aid to poor countries. Its pronouncements carry weight, simply because people listen to them. We might describe how its reputation developed. For example in malaria prevention campaigns, it used to say that DDT shouldn't be sprayed inside huts; then it suddenly changed its position (even though IIRC the science of DDT hadn't changed. --Uncle Ed (talk) 15:51, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:World Health Organization/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: FocalPoint (talk · contribs) 14:01, 15 April 2012 (UTC) A few notes: Several references lack date of publication. Based too much on information from WHO itself. Too big for my taste, but this is personal tase, not necessarily according to GA criteria. Membership section: Pleasant to read but mentions a few small countries - why these and not others? Overall a good article which can be better. --FocalPoint (talk) 14:01, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

The above is not intended to be the only comment for this review. Others reviewers, feel free to continue. --FocalPoint (talk) 15:34, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Comment

There are several unaddressed cleanup tags on this article: Wikipedia articles needing clarification (March 2012), Articles containing potentially dated statements (2002, 2009, 2010, 2012) I have asked the reviewer whether they plan to complete the review. Jezhotwells (talk) 09:01, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

The potentially dated statements come from the use of the {{as of}} and while they show up in the cleanup listing they are most likely not required of a good article (although it could be a good idea to see if the older ones can be updated). AIRcorn (talk) 04:04, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Right, sorry – I didn't notice this review had been undertaken. I'll get to it. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 08:49, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Could anyone point out where clarification is requested? I can't find the tag. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 09:07, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Not 100% sure but I think ot relates to In 1959, the WHO signed Agreement WHA 12–40 with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which some{who} and The nature of this statement has led some{who} pressure groups. The who tags are gone, but still relavent. AIRcorn (talk) 13:42, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

I've reworded that section. As regards the "potentially dated statements", it's a voluntary tagging of statements which will become incorrect – clearly this ought to be most of any article on a current organisation, so it's just choice ones. I couldn't find any newer figures than 2002, but they give an indication, at least. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 15:53, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

I have a hard time seeing this as a serious nomination. Just a quick glance reveals giant issues with the article: formatting is horrible, with content presented more in list-form than in proper prose, referencing depending almost exclusively on a single source, which is the organization itself. I don't think this should have been nominated at all; the improvements needed to get it to GA standard are just way beyond the scope of a GA review. Lampman (talk) 20:41, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Just a quick search: Kelley Lee's The World Health Organization (ISBN 0415370132) is not even mentioned in the article. It's available for preview on Amazon and Google Books, so there's really no excuse not to use it. Lampman (talk) 20:50, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Firstly that's unnecessarily insulting and should not have been said the way it was. Secondly, it is not borne out by the Good Article criteria: 2. Factually accurate and verifiable: (a) it provides references to all sources of information in the section(s) dedicated to the attribution of these sources according to the guide to layout; (b) it provides in-line citations from reliable sources.... It might be you believe that the information presented is not representative of published sources (WP:UNDUE). Given the basic level of the information presented, I cannot see another "side of the story" which should receive attention. The criticisms section is already sourced to alternative sources because WHO's own pages wouldn't do a good job of that. Structural and procedural (eg. aims and methods) notes are not controversial, however, and therefore this isn't a problem. As to reliability, this fundamentally means doubting that the WHO's website is incorrect about details of WHO's operation. I think an exception has to be made here, and it isn't a major one. Per WP:SELFPUB: Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities, without the requirement in the case of self-published sources that they be published experts in the field, so long as: the material is not unduly self-serving and exceptional in nature; it does not involve claims about third parties; it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the source; there is no reasonable doubt as to its authenticity; the article is not based primarily on such sources. Only the final part is even questionable of that test, and here about half the article is based on sources from WHO itself and suitable areas are demarcated (as above) where such sources would not be acceptable. If you doubt the World Health Organization's published information about itself, then I think seeking wider input would be suitable.

On the point of structure I was left with a difficult task. If you take the information presented in bullet points and put it in prose you get a long paragraph that is difficult to navigate. The article doesn't have the space to elaborate on each of the tasks, so a prose portion is likely to look the same. Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Embedded_lists makes it clear that there are plenty of situations where a list might be appropriate and given these reasons I felt it was the best way to present the information.

If you could please drop the tone we can have a proper discussion about what might be the best way of improving the article, if necessary. I am well aware of the criteria and their application. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 22:17, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Review

I have looked at the first section Establishment and even without going into the references in depth it needs a lot of work. It doesn't really flow and lacks important information that would allow an average reader to follow it. Some specifics below:

• Needs some introduction to the League of Nations Health Organization. It currently redirects back to this article, but even if it had its own article it should still have a bit of an introduction here.
• Its efforts were hampered by the Second World War, during which UNRRA also played a role in international health initiatives. Expand UNRRA. I am not sure what this sentence is trying to say. Its efforts at what? What
• In February 1946, the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations helped draft the constitution of the new body What is the new body. The WHO?
• The use of the word "world", rather than "international", emphasised the truly global nature of what the organization was seeking to achieve. How does world rather than international emphasise the truely global nature?
• The constitution of the World Health Organization had been signed by all 61 countries... What countries?
• The first meeting World Health Assembly finished on 24 July 1948, having secured a budget of US$5 million (then GBP£1,250,000) for the 1949 year. Is the World Health Assembly the name of the first meeting?
• Honorifics are to be avoided.
• Its first priorities were malaria, tuberculosis, sexually transmitted infections, maternal and child health, nutrition and environmental hygiene. Curing or something similar I hope.

I know the answer to some, if not most of these questions, but they should still be made clear in the text.

Other stuff from a quick glance:

• The lists are a serious problem. Not just because prose is preferred, but because they are too close to the source. The objectives are a copy paste of [3]. Of couse if you don't take it from the source it runs the risk of being WP:synth. Much better to have prose.
• Current projects is not a great header. It will constatntly need to be updated and runs a real risk of being incorrect.
• I have some reservations about the controversies having their own section. Sure there are controversies associated with the WHO and they should be mentioned, but they would be much better incorporated into the other sections.
• That brings me to another point, there should be sections on its projects (not just a list under current projects). That would allow the controversies to be presented along with each project. A much better way of structuring the article in my opinion.

It is an important encyclopaedic topic and I commend you for taking it on. FocalPoint (talk · contribs) has asked me to continue the review on my talk page. Unfortunately at this stage I will say it is a fail, but I will allow some time for other commentators on this page to respond. It is an artcile I would be personally interested in getting to GA standard so if you wish I may be able to contribute or offer opinions further down the line. AIRcorn (talk) 13:14, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Will fail it in its current state. Feel free to leave me a note on my talk page when you re-nominate it and if I have time I will re-review it. AIRcorn (talk) 08:39, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree that at its current state it does not satisfy the criteria of a good article. --FocalPoint (talk) 13:13, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Another little known activity

are the three WHO sub-organisations in Vienna monitoring/supervising drug and narcotics legislation in all or most countries. Haven't got the list handy, but you'll probably find them.

Why am I writing this? I have become somewhat tired of marijuana legislation advocacy which turns to national or State politicians. Today, in the 2012 presidential election campaign GOP candidate Romney replied to a question of medical marijuana that it was a State issue.

Even that man is ignorant where the nest is, i.e. in the international organisations in Vienna which answer to WHO. I got a little tired of seeing people barking up wrong trees. The right tree would be the UN Assembly passing a resolution to direct the WHO, to direct their sub-organisations to effect .... whatever change they want, if they want change. This perennial debate (since before President Carter) gets on my nerves for one and not grasping where the power structures and levers are is just so ignorant that I felt the need to write. 144.136.192.15 (talk) 03:16, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

This is essentially the same definition of health used by most branches of alternative medicine.

Not really. This is not the case for homeopathy, several forms of electrotherapy along with others others. Quite a few don't really have a concept of health as such. Perhaps what you are referring to is "holistic medicine". Whether WHO's definition of health agrees with that of some areas of alt med is not very important for an article about the WHO. It is probably of interest in some alt med articles though.

I believe that the definitions of palliative care and tradtional mnedicine are completely out of place here OR that they need to be accompanied by ALL WHO definitions of ALL types of medicine/therapies. However, User:Mr-Natural-Health is currently in arbitration over such edits, so I suggest keeping them until that process is completed rather than indulge in an edit war. The article currently stands as a testament to the unbalancing influence of the aformentioned user. Actually, I'll add a boiler. --bodnotbod 09:45, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

Remove them. I put them in because MNH seemed to think defintions were nesscary and I was trying to be fair.Geni 12:52, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The WHO publishing drafts on homeopathy in a positive light is concerning. It wouldn't be if they investigated "alternative" therapies scientifically. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.182.91.94 (talk) 01:50, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

establishment of WHO

Your article states that WHO was established on 4/7/1948 when it was ratified by the 26th member state. The article in the New York Times, 2/8/1948, p. 44, says that WHO came into existence on 2/7/28, after the 29th UN country ratified its charter. These statements seem to conflict with one another. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 38.98.224.98 (talk) 18:37, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

'United Nations' is a name

'United Nations' is a name, not a description. 'International Business Machines' is another example of a name (as opposed to a description). The expression 'the United Nations' is therefore confused language, like it also would be mistaken to refer to IBM as 'the International Business Machines'.

It would improve the language of this article if United Nations were properly referred to by using its name as just that, a name. That is to say one should refer to UN as simply 'United Nations', and avoid referring to it as 'the United Nations'. Of course this also applies to 'World Health Organization' (a name, not a description). --62.16.186.44 (talk) 02:47, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Don't agree. These public bodies take "the" because the final word is an abstract noun, as "the World Health Organization", "the International Monetary Fund", or "the European Union" - the first word of all these articles is "The". We would say "I'm taking over IBM" but "I'm taking over the IBM company". And how about "the United States"? Going back to origins, before the founding of the present-day UN organization, "the United Nations" was a synonym for "the Allies of World War II": Noyster (talk), 12:33, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Name in other languages

I've moved the translations of the name from the top of the infobox to a new section, as the mass of black text seemed to me to be getting out of hand. There are several thousand languages and they wouldn't all fit where they were. Also the infobox has been shifted to below the lead, to cut down on white space. Please say here if you don't agree with either action: Noyster (talk), 10:40, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Dr. Abha Saxena, Coordinator, Global Health Ethics

I think we should have a section on the WHO 'Global Health Ethics' office, which is currently headed (Coordinated) by Dr. Abha Saxena. Alternatively, an article on Dr. Saxena would be useful and helpful to the Wikipedia project. MaynardClark (talk) 16:53, 1 May 2017 (UTC)

Linky edits

Change home page links in external links from http to https, thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:14BA:984A:F200:0:0:0:8EA (talk) 22:13, 1 February 2020 (UTC)  Done Outriggr (talk) 11:05, 2 February 2020 (UTC) Thank you Outriggr. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:14BA:984A:F200:0:0:0:8EA (talk) 10:39, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

structure

current revision of the page states that UN member states as of 2004 are 192, but that is wrong. They are 191. 192 are the WHO members, but not all of them are UN member states, and also not all UN member states are members of the WHO. Look at the link that I added at the bottom. Becouse of that number-mismatch-error I suspise that maybe the whole text is not correct: "UN Member States (..error..) appoint delegations to the World Health Assembly, WHO's supreme decision-making body". Someone to check all this? I will try to correct the members-error, but for the structural architecture of WHO I don't know anything... Why is Liechtenstein not participating? Are all WHO members sending delegations - including assosiated Cook Isands and Niue (as I have written) or only the regular state members? If all are sending delegations - what is the difference between regular and assosiated member? Why only New Zealand's self-governing territories are "independent" WHO members, but not similar territories of other states?

Alinor 12:51, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I checked the WHO constitution to clarify the WHO/UN membership issue. Hope the current text is clear. Rd232 20:51, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

budget of the WHO/partnership section

I don't think that half the budget of the WHO comes from Lucifer Trust. From what I understand the majority of the funding for WHO comes from its members countries - I don't think WHO receives much money at all directly from foundation and industry (or from individuals - though they do offer the possibly to donate with their website).

Also the public-private partnerships listed on this page work "with" the WHO but in most cases receive no financial support from WHO. Many are independent foundations - with no official links to the WHO. I think that the paragraph on partnerships is very misleading. It makes it look like the partnerships listed are part of the WHO.

I notice that this same information is repeated on the Public-Private Parterships page. I don't know enough yet about Wikipedia to suggest how to fix this - but a good source of some additional information on public-private partnerships related to health can be found at

http://www.mmv.org/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=27

I think this website above is not critical enough of private-public partnerships! Please compare with views held by Health Action International:

http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/PPI/seminar200011.html

History?

Dear writer of this article,

There is an omission of the true event that made WHO.

What was that event? There was someone who had a disease and recovered sane. He brought his story to, I don't know who, but those people acknowledged his story and founded the WHO.

Is this weird?

It is up to you.

145.129.136.48 (talk) 12:05, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 March 2020

Change "The Republic of China (Taiwan) however is currently no member of the WHO" to "The Republic of China (Taiwan) however is currently not a member of the WHO" under the Membership section. 2606:A000:1127:C197:8C1E:5977:A99F:9215 (talk) 22:16, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out, we also use Taiwan rather than the truncated and unwieldy Republic of China (Taiwan) so I’l make both corrections. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 22:25, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Unlock please

Any particular reason why this page remains locked? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 36.11.225.151 (talk) 00:32, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Controversies Covid-19

It would be good to put under the controversies topic of COVID-19, what is mentioned here about December 2019: 2019-20 coronavirus pandemic Aelray (talk) 12:06, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. —KuyaBriBri^Talk 13:29, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Current financing

The paragraph wrongly ends with a comma instead of a period. I find undue weight is given to US internal politics with two sentences about Republican support for Trump. It's just one of 194 member states. The Alliance for Multilateralism for Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Estonia, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Germany, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland declared they fully support the World Health Organization in leading the global public health response to the COVID 19 pandemic and "commit, on a voluntary basis, to provide resources in support of the WHO’s COVID-19 Strategic Preparedness and Response Plan". [4] (By the way as I saw there was no article for this alliance I set up a draft but would need some help for improving it.) Supsudelu (talk) 07:09, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

PRC influence, add?

• Kristine Lee It’s Not Just the WHO: How China Is Moving on the Whole U.N.; Despite his saber-rattling, Trump’s pullback actually helps Beijing in its new, inside-baseball strategy to build influence. 15 April 2020 Politico

X1\ (talk) 09:04, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Already covered in the article. —Granger (talk · contribs) 15:26, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

"World Health Organization (WHO)" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect World Health Organization (WHO). Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. TheAwesomeHwyh 21:45, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

"World Health Organisation (WHO)" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect World Health Organisation (WHO). Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. TheAwesomeHwyh 21:47, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 23 April 2020

Change "The current chairman of the executive board is Dr. Assad Hafeez." to "The current chairman of the executive board is Dr. Hiroki Nakatani." Source: https://apps.who.int/gb/gov/en/chairman-and-officers-of-the-executive-board_en.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2405:201:800:6755:1D7:67ED:6DCB:EFFB (talk) 15:16, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

 Done - Zefr (talk) 15:30, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Requesting edits for Heads of WHO

Apart from the Director General (Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus), all other heads of WHO (deputy director generals) have changed designations or have moved out. Current list of leadership : https://www.who.int/dg/who-headquarters-leadership-team — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sahilmodi21 (talk • contribs) 15:49, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done. It's not clear what changes you want to make. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 16:02, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Peter Salama (RIP)

Unfortunately Peter Salama is no longer head of the WHO as is displayed on Wiki, as he passed away Sjek (talk) 09:42, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Fixed. Prolog (talk) 11:34, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Edit request

I propose to revise the first para of the "Opposition by the United States" section as follows. I added footnotes explaining my thinking for the various highlighted edits. Obviously those should not be added to the article.

On 14 April 2020, United States President Donald Trump pledged to halt United States funding to the WHO while reviewing the WHO's role in "severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus." The United States had paid half of its annual assessed fees to the WHO as of 31 March 2020; it would ordinarily pay its remaining fees in September 2020. World leaders and health experts largely condemned President Trump's announcement, which came amid criticism of his response to the outbreak in the United States. WHO called the announcement "regrettable" and defended its actions in alerting the world to the emergence of COVID-19. Trump critics also said that such a suspension would be illegal, though legal experts speaking to Politifact said its legality could depend on the particular way in which the suspension was executed. In mid-May, Trump pledged to permanently terminate all American funding of WHO and end its membership if there were not "improvements" by WHO.

Thoughts? 151.194.65.68 (talk) 17:24, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

 Done Looks good, I didn't change the second highlight though (kept 'its' instead of 'the WHO's) as I think it's clear enough and it's better to avoid repeating 'the WHO' too much. GoodCrossing (talk) 20:33, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 May 2020

trump has already cut funds to the WHO and redirected them to more deserving organizations Baisil1234 (talk) 07:03, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. --TheImaCow (talk) 07:29, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Spinoff article for Controversies section

I'm noticing that the "Controversies" section is getting large on this article, which itself is over 100k bytes in size. Does any editor have any immediate objections to a new article (created via a copy-paste with attribution) at Controversies relating to the World Health Organization? SamHolt6 (talk) 23:35, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes, the Covid portion is obviously of great significance for not only the WHO but also the world as a whole. Adoring nanny (talk) 01:36, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Dedicated "Controversies" articles tend to be discouraged, see WP:CSECTION. There's a risk of such an article becoming a WP:POVFORK. A better idea might be to rewrite this article somewhat, incorporating the information about controversies into a broader description of WHO activities and history, so that a "Controversies" section isn't needed. Some of the more flash-in-the-pan controversies like "Intermittent preventive therapy" could possibly just be removed. —Granger (talk · contribs) 01:57, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Well reading the recommendation from WP:CSECTION, it's both the controversies article *and* sections that are discouraged ! I think however the current state isn't handling that too badly by moving much of that material to sub-articles which treat each subject as an event as recommended by WP:CSECTION, instead of including them directly inside a massive controversies section. Jmdwp (talk) 16:47, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

This article needs a more systematic approach

Please consider a more systematic approach to choosing and describing topics. This should be a general rule and below are just 2 examples:
1) If Travel Expenses of WHO are a controversy, a systematic description of what are those expenses and why they are considered controversial. Providing one single case of someone staying in an expensive hotel without any critical appraisal of that situation seems highly biased and inappropriate for Wikipedia. Please consider removing that section or editing it based on systematic research.
2) If it is actually even worth mentioning in Wikipedia, then the section on Robert Mugabe's role as a goodwill ambassador should likely be removed and this information could be just one of many other entries under the heading Mistakes or Diplomatic Faux Pas, or whatever it would be called. Systematic research of the topic should be a general rule in Wikipedia. Otherwise what is its value?
Gianluigi Ambrogino (talk) 15:56, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 17 June 2020

I would like to add the following under the heading ‘controversies’ and subheading ‘2019-20 COVID-19 pandemic’. It elaborates on The World Health Organizations science communication during the COVID-19 pandemic and addresses some concerns with there not yet being enough evidence for The World Health Organization to make a claim.

The World Health Organization was also criticized during the pandemic for communicating conflicting information. An expert from The World Health organization made a statement claiming that the transmission of COVID-19 by someone who did not have symptoms was rare (“Corona Virus Live”, 2020). They believe that pre-symptomatic patients can spread the disease, but have not found tracing of asymptomatic transmission (Reuters, 2020). The W.H.O was tremendously criticized for conveying this information to the public because there is not enough evidence to confidently support or refute it (“Corona Virus Live”, 2020). The World Health Organization responded to various criticisms by making a new statement explaining that their information was only based on a few studies and expressing the importance of preventative measures like face masks and social distancing (“Corona Virus Live”, 2020). The World Health Organization also held a question and answer session to explain what is known and unknown about asymptomatic transmission based off of known data and addressed what asymptomatic means and entails (Joseph, 2020). According to The World Health Organization, asymptomatic is when a patient is infected but has no symptoms (Joseph, 2020). Pre-symptomatic is the period before the onset of symptoms when someone is infected, so they start out as asymptomatic and then later develop symptoms (Joseph, 2020). However, scientists claim that asymptomatic can be confused with paucisymptomatic cases, which appear to show no symptoms but is actually a very mild form of the disease (Howard, 2020). Scientists and experts have not come to all agreed on a concrete decision on whether asymptomatic patients can transmit COVID-19 or not because the virus has only been around for less than a year (Press, 2020). There are various claims that both support and refute transmissions from asymptomatic, pre-symptomatic, and paucisymptomatic patients (Press, 2020). This can be harmful because conflicting evidence communicated from various experts on their point of view for this decision can confuse the public and make them less likely to follow preventative measures (Press, 2020). Thus, The World Health Organization refuted their claim due to the lack of concrete evidence and conflicting data that could lead to less preventative measures and worsen the pandemic.

Coronavirus Live Updates: Fauci Delivers Grim Assessment, Saying, 'It Isn't Over Yet'. (2020, June 09). Retrieved June 09, 2020, from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/09/world/coronavirus-us-usa.html Howard, J. (2020, June 9). Coronavirus spread by asymptomatic people 'appears to be rare,' WHO official says. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/08/health/coronavirus-asymptomatic-spread-who-bn/ index.html. Accessed 16 June 2020. Joseph, A. (2020, June 9). WHO clarifies comments on asymptomatic spread of Covid-19. STAT. https:// www.statnews.com/2020/06/09/who-comments-asymptomatic-spread-covid-19/. Accessed 15 June 2020. Press, T. A. (2020, June 9). Confusion Reigns as UN Scrambles Mask, Virus Spread Advice. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2020/06/09/world/europe/ap-eu-virus-outbreak-mask- confusion.html?searchResultPosition=1. Accessed 16 June 2020. Reuters. (2020, June 3). Explainer: Are Asymptomatic COVID-19 Patients Safe or Silent Carriers? The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2020/06/03/world/asia/03reuters-health-coronavirus-asymptomatic-explainer.html? searchResultPosition=2. Accessed 16 June 2020. Nrandazzza (talk) 20:21, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

 Not done - This is more of a soapbox issue, WP:SOAP, and is not central to the role of WHO in the COVID-19 pandemic, WP:UNDUE. Zefr (talk) 22:37, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 July 2020

Under membership: "The government of Taiwan was allowed to participate as an observer from 2009–2016, but has not been invited gain since."

should be: "The government of Taiwan was allowed to participate as an observer from 2009–2016, but has not been invited again since."

spelling: gain to again Xxproto (talk) 22:44, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

 Done Thank you for pointing this out!--regentspark (comment) 00:52, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Logo way too big

Why is the logo so big — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.254.10.148 (talk) 01:38, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, has now been fixed. —Granger (talk · contribs) 06:25, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

Did the USA actually withdraw from the WHO? Article is unclear

It currently reads: "On 7 July 2020, President Trump formally notified the UN of his intent to withdraw the United States from the WHO.[101] However, President Joe Biden announced plans to rejoin, and signed an executive order to that effect after his inauguration.[102][103]" Plans to rejoin would mean it actually left, but the article only mentions an "intention" to leave. Did the USA actually leave, and if so, on what date? 2.31.162.82 (talk) 14:57, 20 March 2021 (UTC)

The US government announced plans to withdraw but did not actually withdraw. I've edited the article to clarify this. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 15:28, 20 March 2021 (UTC)

Reception of the WHO

Would it be beneficial to include a section about public perception and views on the WHO? I don't see a specific section or page for it, but there certainly seems to be a lot of opinions on it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.36.169.215 (talk) 04:55, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Awkward section Global institutions

The current Global institutions section feels awkward. It announces that there are "other institutions" (plural), with a very weak source to establish that; then only one (singular) institution is itemized. Shouldn't this information just get plowed into another section as one sentence? Cyberflag1 (talk) 13:50, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Controversies

Why is there no mention of Trump trying to cancel the WHO, defund it and blame it for complicity in the "China virus" (as he calls it)? Has this article been censored? Seems to happen a lot on Wikipedia. Especially when the "alt-Right" are involved. 2.28.151.250 (talk) 14:52, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

It's clearly outlined in the article. Do you need assistance in finding it? Kuru (talk) 19:04, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

==Abuse of power in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ebola Response== In 2021, 51 women accused WHO staff (and also staff at UNICEF, Oxfam, Medecins Sans Frontieres, International Organization for Migration, World Vision and ALIMA) of sexual exploitation and abuse in D. R. Congo during 2018 and 2020. Many of them did not how to report it 29 women became pregnant and were forced by the perpetrators to have abortions. WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called the situation "inexcusable" and said he would work to reform the organization and hold the perpetrators to account.

I suggest we keep it? CT55555 (talk) 20:09, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

This feels like recentism to me. In the WHO's 70+ year history, there have surely been other incidents of this scale, but none of them get their own section in the article. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:10, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

If you think there are more incidents where dozens of WHO staff were raped by their supervisors, I'd absolutely say that should be added too! i.e. I don't agree at all. CT55555 (talk) 16:18, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

How about a Criticism section?

For example, The Guardian has criticized the WHO for downplaying the risk of nitrite-treated meats.

Some Covid-related criticism could be culled together from various sections, but I'm not an expert on that. -- Dandv 13:13, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

Designated "Criticism" sections are generally not a good idea because they're a magnet for NPOV issues. See WP:CSECTION. This article already includes information about criticism of the WHO, incorporated into several different sections. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:29, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

Includes Section for Scandals and protests related to WHO.

There are plenty of criticism of WHO, i added the Scandals and Protest sections, feel free to expand it. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 16:06, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I agree with User:Mx._Granger reverting your edit. I don't think people objecting the appointment of the leader is a "scandal". It's just disagreement, and disagreement with multinational organizations is normal, not scandalous. CT55555 (talk) 16:44, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@CT55555: I could only move on the title name and change it to > criticism <, but removing the entire edit which is reliably sourced will lead to content disputes, i intend to add further criticsm of this organization, for which there's plenty, enough to warrant it's own section. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 16:55, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I don't know if "content dispute" has some sort of technical meaning, but yes I agree that we are both disagreeing on content. I consider this to be a normal thing here, we disagree, we discuss, we try to reach consensus. CT55555 (talk) 17:16, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

This incident seems too minor to merit mention in this article. It is a minor blip in the 70+ year history of the World Health Organization. Also, we shouldn't have a section titled "Scandals and protests" for the reasons described at WP:CSECTION; controversies involving the WHO are already incorporated into other sections of the article as they should be. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:48, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@Mx. Granger: As explained in the edit summary and here, there's enough WHO related critism to warrant it's own section also outside of Covid-19. You can expand it, but well sourced remove critism will lead to content disputes. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 16:55, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

A criticism section is not a good idea, here or in most articles, for the reasons explained at WP:CSECTION. Criticism of the WHO is already described in other sections of the article, as it should be. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 16:58, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I've seen plenty articles with criticisms sections, and they seemed appropriate to me, I think the link WP:CSECTION is an essay and therefore just one or more person's opinions, rather than a policy. I do actually agree it is sensible to have a criticisms section, I just don't think that some people objection to the choice of leader is notable. CT55555 (talk) 17:05, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@Mx. Granger: Acccording to you, and not the policy as i read it, WHO falls under organizations, the reliable sources are there. This will warrant next steps at dispute resolution. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 17:10, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@CT55555: You can change the leader, but remove the critism all together is an issue. Yes plenty of articles have controversies and critism sections, and there is enough reliable sources criticizing the WHO. Dawit S Gondaria (talk) 17:15, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Removed recent addition about WHO website

I've removed this recently added content because in my opinion this is not encyclopedic content but rather WP:OR: "The organization created a special page on its site dedicated to questions and answers about COVID-19 pandemic and Climate change. The page was updated in the last time on 22 of April 2020. According to the page, almost all recent pandemic are linked to disturbed ecosystems and climate change can affect the spread of the pandemic indirectly (for example by increasing water scarcity), but there is not any evidence about a direct link between climate change and the emergence of the pandemic. In January 2021 a research linking climate change to the emergence of the pandemic was published in the journal "Science of total environment. It was cited by at least 21 other studies, but the organization did not change anything on the page." EMsmile (talk) 16:22, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

References

Conspiracy Theories Covid/Global Health dictatorship

There are so many. Neeeds single section. (Unsigned comment was by User:Lovemankind83) CT55555 (talk) 01:41, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

Hard no. Obviously. This is an encyclopaedia. What this page does not need is people introducing conspiracy theories. CT55555 (talk) 01:40, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

BioHub Pilot Project

Reuters has written an article about the WHO's new pilot program called BioHub, which was started in 2021 in the Spiez Laboratory, as a way to try to get countries to share virus data with one another and combat future outbreaks. This founding and implementation of the BioHub program could maybe be included in the "Operational history of WHO" subsection of the "History" section of this article for the year of "2021". Article reference: Rigby, Jennifer (July 31, 2022). "Inside the super-secure Swiss lab trying to stop the next pandemic". www.reuters.com. Retrieved July 31, 2022. Smellyshirt5 (talk) 16:22, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

New draft on Taiwan and the WHO

Draft:Taiwan and the World Health Organization. ScrumptiousFood (talk) 22:15, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Please add under "Data Handling and Publications"

The WHO maintains the VigiAccess database, which is searchable and open to the public:

Thank you very kindly, 2600:4040:780C:6F00:CC87:C7B1:3676:111E (talk) 11:43, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

No section about criticism and conspiracy theories

There has to be a section about the criticism and the conspiracy theories surrounding the WHO. GreatLeader1945 (talk) 16:15, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

In most cases "criticism" sections are not a good way to organize article content, for the reasons described at WP:CSECTION. Instead, information should be organized by topic. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 20:38, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Mx. Granger That's absolutely not true. Criticism and/or conspiracy theories sections are often present in many Wiki articles about important organizations, people etc. GreatLeader1945 (talk) 09:20, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

In most cases they shouldn't be. "Criticism" sections tend to lead to NPOV problems and interfere with logical organization of an article. It's better to organize information by topic like this article does, with criticism mentioned where relevant, instead of rearranging negative material into its own section. I have not often seen articles with a "Conspiracy theories" section, but that seems like an undue weight issue waiting to happen. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 14:15, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

@Mx. Granger >"I have not often seen articles with a "Conspiracy theories" section [...]" I said "articles about important organizations, people etc.". There aren't many such articles that fit this category to begin with, thus you "have not ofteen seen" such sections tbh. GreatLeader1945 (talk) 13:58, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• Mx. Granger & GreatLeader1945   Agree with Great Leader.   Let's not try to confuse criticism with theories. There is much criticism about the preoccupation of the WHO with abortion, as if abortion has anything to do with the health of the world. Abortion is not even metnioned here. There's also much criticism about their handling of the COVID crisis. It doesn't matter 'how many' other articles have criticism sections. The question is, is it warranted here? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:29, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

See:

• How the 'bureaucratic' World Health Organization ended up on the hot seat over its COVID response   U.S. announces it's withdrawing from WHO, citing undue influence from China
• How China Deceived the WHO
• BBC: Covid: Serious failures in WHO and global response, report finds
• REUTERS: WHO's Tedros disappointed by end of U.S. abortion ruling Roe v Wade - Gwillhickers (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 21:34, 6 February 2024‎ (UTC)

Criticism of the WHO's response to COVID-19 is already covered in the relevant section of this article, and in more detail in the article World Health Organization's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 14:30, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

@GreatLeader1945 and Mx. Granger: — The issue, here, is really about criticism in general, and while there's a dedicated article for COVID, this doesn't mean we can't summarize accounts of criticism, in an objective manner, in this article, with a link to the dedicated article, which is the common practice.. Aside from mention of criticism as concerns COVID, this article overall comes off like a promotional piece and is begging for a neutrality tag. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:39, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

This article currently discusses criticism about various topics (including the status of Taiwan, affiliation with Robert Mugabe, and the role of the regional offices, among others) in the sections where they're relevant. We shouldn't create a dedicated "criticism" section, for the reasons described at WP:CSECTION. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 05:32, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, WP:CSECTION says -- "An article dedicated to negative criticism of a topic, as well as one dedicated to accolades and praises is usually discouraged ...".. One section out of twenty + sections by no means makes the article "dedicated to negative criticism". There is more than enough criticism about this entity to warrant one such section. There are other significant criticisms not even mentioned here, starting with their position on abortion as a form of health care, when virtually all abortions are performed on those who simply don't want their baby. Referring to it as a needed form of "health care", on a global scale no less, is misleading to say the least and makes them a partisan organization. Abortion is not even mentioned once in this article. To be fair, the WHO considers Female gentile mutilation (FGM), openly practiced in many third-world countries, as an affront to humanity. Good for them The article would improve if this also was adequately covered, imo-- Gwillhickers (talk) 18:04, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

If there are reliable sources discussing the WHO's work related to abortion and/or FGM, I have no objection to adding those to the article, in whichever sections they're relevant to. I suggest you read WP:CSECTION again, as it discusses both "criticism" articles and "criticism" sections; both tend to lead to NPOV issues and are not usually the best way to organize content. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 04:21, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I read the material and I believe I quoted the most appropriate passage and addressed any concern about too much focus on criticism. Perhaps it would be best to name a proposed section as Performance assessment, where this idea can be covered as it applies to the acclaim or criticism the WHO has received.regarding issues like abortion, human rights, FGM and so forth, rather than having this overall idea buried in the body of text.. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 23:37, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

I'm okay with a "Performance assessment" section. That said, the WHO's activities are so complex and varied, I still think it may be more useful to put assessments of each aspect of the organization in the section about that aspect. 15:39, 10 February 2024 (UTC)