World Health Organization(WHO) Funding

News:The US President has threatened to freeze US funding to the World Health Organization(WHO) due to negligence on coronavirus pandemic and for its China Centric approach.

Facts:

Funding:There are four kinds of contributions that make up funding for the WHO which are:

• Assessed contributions:These are the dues countries pay in order to be a member of the Organization.The amount each Member State must pay is calculated relative to the country’s wealth and population.
• Voluntary contributions:It comes from Member States (in addition to their assessed contribution) or from other partners.They can range from flexible to highly earmarked.
• Core voluntary contributions:It allows less well-funded activities to benefit from a better flow of resources and ease implementation bottlenecks that arise when immediate financing is lacking.
• Pandemic Influenza Preparedness(PIP) Contributions:It was started in 2011 to improve and strengthen the sharing of influenza viruses with human pandemic potential and to increase the access of developing countries to vaccines and other pandemic related supplies. 

Additional Facts:

• Currently,the United States is the WHO’s biggest contributor making up 14.67% of total funding.
• The biggest programme area where the money is allocated is polio eradication(26.51 per cent).