The United States officially notified the United Nations on Tuesday of its withdrawal from the World Health Organization, a White House official said.
The notice, which comes as the coronavirus pandemic continues to spread around the globe, was submitted to the U.N. secretary-general and to Congress. The withdrawal is expected to take effect July 6, 2021.
“I disagree with the president’s decision,” Alexander, chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said in a statement. “Certainly there needs to be a good, hard look at mistakes the World Health Organization might have made in connection with coronavirus, but the time to do that is after the crisis has been dealt with, not in the middle of it.
“Withdrawing U.S. membership could, among other things, interfere with clinical trials that are essential to the development of vaccines, which citizens of the United States as well as others in the world need,” he added. “And withdrawing could make it harder to work with other countries to stop viruses before they get to the United States.”
