International Health Regulation Amendments Strengthen Global Pandemic Preparedness. On June 3, 2024, the U.S. Department of State, in a display of its leadership in global health, announced the most significant updates to the International Health Regulations (IHR) in nearly 20 years. The delegation to the World Health Assembly, led by the 25th U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary, Xavier Becerra, and delegates from other World Health Organization-member countries, successfully adopted several amendments to the IHR — a set of rules on global responses to public health emergencies.
These amendments will:
▷ Enhance transparency and timeliness of information and make the global health security architecture stronger overall while maintaining full respect for the sovereignty of individual states;
▷ Improve access to critical health products to more equitably prevent, prepare, and respond to pandemic emergencies, regardless of where they arise; and
▷ Take steps to better identify and close critical gaps in health security capacities, including establishing an Implementation Committee to stop outbreaks before they threaten Americans and our security.
These developments will ensure that the United States is better prepared to respond to the next international health emergency. They demonstrate that countries can come together and tackle global challenges to improve the lives of people around the world and provide momentum for concluding the Pandemic Agreement, which nations agreed to finalize by May 2025.
As the world’s leading foreign assistance donor, the U.S. commitment to health and health security is not just a national effort, but a global one. America has pledged $700 million to the new Pandemic Fund. It believes in its mission to provide a dedicated stream of additional, long-term financing to strengthen core capacities in low- and middle-income countries, thereby reinforcing global health security.
Since 1980, outbreaks of new and long-standing infectious diseases have been occurring with increasing frequency and intensity. In response, the World Health Assembly, the governing body of the World Health Organization, has been amending the IHR, most recently in June 2024.
Tiaji Salaam-Blyther, a Specialist in Global Health, and Matthew C. Weed, a Specialist in foreign policy legislation, address common questions regarding the IHR, including the role of the U.S. Congress in this piece for the Congressional Research Service released on June 24, 2024.
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Vice President, Chief Medical Director of Quality, Performance and Innovation, CHRISTUS Health- RETIRED
6moI find it interesting that we have no "SYSTEM" in the US for managing healthcare, only sick care that is siloed and yet we are attempting to partner with other countries that are far more comprehensive and systematic than we are. I wonder if we are too proud to learn from them?