WHO braces for staff cuts in Geneva amid US funding withdrawal

WHO: redundancies amid cuts in US funding Keystone-SDA

The WHO’s Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned on Tuesday that US budget cuts are putting the UN agency in financial trouble, forcing it to scale back operations and lay off staff.

+ Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox

“The United States’ refusal to pay its assessed contributions for 2024 and 2025, along with cuts in development aid from other countries, means we’re facing a payroll deficit of $560 million (CHF460 million) to $650 million for 2026 and 2027,” Ghebreyesus told member states, according to a transcript of his speech.

The United Nations (UN) health agency has been bracing for the complete withdrawal of the US, its largest donor by far, starting next January.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump’s administration has refused to pay the agreed dues for 2024 and 2025 and has frozen almost all US foreign aid, including significant support for global health projects.

A number of other countries have also cut their development aid spending.

Biggest impact at the Geneva headquarters

In response to this situation, the WHO has started planning its new structure, which the Director-General presented to staff and member states on Tuesday.

The current wage bill shortfall “represents around 25% of staff costs,” he said, adding that “this doesn’t necessarily mean a 25% reduction in the number of roles.”

He didn’t specify how many jobs would be cut but mentioned that the biggest impact is expected at the organisation’s headquarters in Geneva. “We’re starting with management cuts,” he said, “even though these are very painful decisions for us.”

“We’re cutting the management team at headquarters from 12 to 7 members, and the number of departments will drop from 76 to 34, more than halving,” said Ghebreyesus.

Translated from French with DeepL/sp

How we work

We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate them into English. A journalist then briefly reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy before publication. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. The news stories we select have been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team from news agencies such as Bloomberg or Keystone.

Did you find this explanation helpful? Please fill out the short survey below to help us understand your needs.

Don’t miss your chance to make a difference! Take our survey and share your thoughts.