Will Elon Musk’s Tweet Further Misconceptions About The WHO Pandemic Accord?

Billionaire Elon Musk said what about WHO? Musk, the CEO of Twitter, was once again full of tweet on Thursday. But one particular tweet from the self-described Chief Twit got the attention of Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, who’s been the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) since 2017. This Musk tweet said, “Countries should not cede authority to WHO.” That prompted Ghebreyesus to clearly state that “Countries aren’t ceding authority to the WHO,” just in case Musk’s tweet end up seeding some misconceptions about who the WHO is and what what the WHO Pandemic Accord is going to be about.

Musk’s piece of tweet was only part of this WHO, when, what the bleep situation. Musk’s tweet was actually a response to the following tweet posted four hours prior by someone called Kanekoa the Great: “Sen. Malcolm Roberts says that Australia should not cede its sovereignty to the WHO due to the organization’s corruption that generates billions for its owner, Bill Gates and because Tedros is an evil ‘killer’ tied to a terrorist organization.” Yikes.

Now if you are wondering who Kanekoa is and why this person is so great, the account’s Twitter bio doesn’t offer much. It states, “Banned by Vijaya, Resurrected by Elon, Independent Citizen Journalist,” which is what many other anonymous Twitter accounts could potentially claim. Calling yourself an “Independent Citizen Journalist” just because you write stuff on the Internet would be sort of like calling yourself a model just because you pranced in front of your cat in your underwear. Making your cat walk away is not the same as walking the catwalk.

Kanekoa the Great’s tweet and Musk’s response ended being more than just two tweets to the wind, though. Kanekoa the Great’s tweet has already gotten over 11.3 K re-tweets. And Musk’s response to that tweet may have further amplified it and in some people’s eyes somehow validated it. So those two things combined got the attention of a lot of people including Ghebreyesus.

If you are wondering which U.S. State this Senator Roberts represents, go Southwest-ward in the U.S. as much as you can and keep heading down under for, oh, about, 8,000 or so more miles. Roberts is actually a Senator in Australia not the U.S. Kanekoa the Great’s tweet included a video clip of Roberts ranting about the current Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, the WHO, and Ghebreyesus. In the video clip, Roberts did some Gates crashing as well, calling Gates the “WHO’s current ‘Sugar Daddy.’” Roberts claimed, “Gates bought the WHO and they now recommend his products. It is that simple.”

Umm, no, it’s not that simple. Roberts didn’t provide much verifiable hard evidence to support his claims. For example, Roberts in the clip didn’t specify what products he was referring to in his rant. In general, the WHO doesn’t recommend products without providing significant amounts of scientific evidence supporting their use. Typically, they are products that have already received authorization or approval from a range of regulatory bodies around the world such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Japan’s Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency (PMDA), and the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

Plus, it’s not as if the WHO is this governing body that has power over all of the countries in the world. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The WHO is beholden to its 194 member states, consisting of countries and territories around the world. A country or territory can become a member of the WHO by ratifying the Constitution of the World Health Organization and contributing to the WHO’s budget. These member states, in turn, appoint delegates to the World Health Assembly, which is the governing body for the WHO. Thus, ultimately, it’s the countries around the world that can determine what the WHO does and not the other way around.

In fact, Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine and author of the book Preventing the Next Pandemic: Vaccine Diplomacy in a Time of Anti-science, called the WHO more of a “convener/coordinating body that works for its 194 member states” rather than some kind of governing body in the following tweet forward of what Musk had tweeted or twotten:

As you can see, Hotez referred to Roberts’ rant by tweeting, “The paranoid rant from the elected official in Australia regarding Bill Gates or Dr Tedros, is…well just that. And it is unfair and hurtful.” Hotez also included a Kaiser Family Foundation fact sheet about “The U.S. Government and the World Health Organization,” published on May 19, 2022. This fact sheet indicated that the “WHO relies on contributions from member states and private organizations for funding to implement its budget and work plan” and that the biennial WHO budget for 2022-2023 was $6.12 billion.” That’s not a whole lot of money to do all that the WHO has to do. Such a budget is about 2% of a Musk, given that Musk’s estimated net worth was around $196 billion as of mid-February.

The WHO Director-General himself responded to Musk’s tweet by emphasizing, “Countries aren’t ceding sovereignty to @WHO. The #PandemicAccord won’t change that,” as you can see here:

Ghebreyesus continued by stating the following about the WHO Pandemic Accord: “The accord will help countries better guard against pandemics. It will help us to better protect people regardless of whether they live in countries that are rich or poor.” This Pandemic Accord hasn’t reached the approval and ratification stage yet. There’s been an initial so-called “Zero Draft” that was presented by the WHO to member states on February 1 and currently under consideration. The WHO, it’s member states, and various experts are likely going to deliberate and revise this draft as often as the Kardashians change styles over the ensuing year. May 2024 is the target month for the WHO to present the final draft to the World Health Assembly. But time will tell whether they manage to meet this timeline.

Anyone who bothers to read the “Zero Draft” will realize that many of the claims about the Pandemic Accord out there are backed by zero evidence. Trying to establish a Pandemic Accord is not really about countries ceding authority to the WHO. It’s more about members states realizing that they have to cooperate more with each other to better prepare for and respond to the next pandemic. After all, in 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic caught much of the world with its proverbial pants down while many countries ended up cooperating about as well as a bunch of cats in a trash bag.

One thing’s for sure: more novel infectious disease threats are going to emerge in the future, very likely the near future. Heck different novel coronavirus outbreaks have now occurred three times since the original severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus emerged in 2002. The Covid-19 pandemic is probably not going to be a once-in-a-lifetime situation unless you happen to be a Giant Sunda Rat.