Pandemic treaty comes as welcome sign of multilateralism

The new pandemic treaty is set to be adopted at the World Health Assembly, which starts in Geneva on Monday. Hailed as a historic achievement, it comes as the United States has withdrawn from the WHO. At the end of May, the World Health Assembly (WHA), the decision-making body of the World Health Organization (WHO), is expected to adopt the new pandemic agreement aimed at better preparing for future pandemics. In the words of Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO, this is a “historic” moment. It will make the world safer, he said when the negotiations by WHO members ended in April. The treaty took three years to finalise – quick for an international agreement – amid resistance from some developed countries about sharing technology with developing countries in case of a pandemic. It comes as US President Donald Trump has challenged the UN-based multilateral system. One of his first executive orders was to pull the US out of the WHO. The US is the WHO’s biggest ...