U.S. health agencies joined WHO's flu meeting despite Trump's plan to pull out
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration took part in a World Health Organization meeting to discuss flu vaccine composition, an official at the UN agency said on Friday.
President Donald Trump started the 12-month withdrawal process for the U.S. to leave the WHO on his first day in office in January and has since also overseen a dismantling of U.S. foreign aid that has hit health programs worldwide.
"We hope that the pause in the work that we're doing with the U.S. is temporary and we hope that we will be able to resume that in full force in the coming weeks," said Maria Van Kerkhove, Director of Department of Epidemic and Pandemic Preparedness and Prevention at WHO.
"There's information that's coming out from the U.S. Department of Agriculture on the animal side, so I want to be very clear that the U.S. is still contributing," Kerkhove said.
The comments came on the sidelines of an event where the WHO announced its recommendations for the composition of influenza vaccines for 2025-2026 in the Northern Hemisphere.
The global health body has recommended that vaccines include updated H3N2 strains, mirroring the composition advised for the Southern Hemisphere.
It also recommended that zoonotic vaccines include two additional strains of bird flu viruses, partly in response to a human case detected last year in Australia.
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Despite its broader pullback from the WHO, the U.S. has not moved to quit the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the specialized health agency for the Americas and the WHO's regional office for the Americas.
However, disruptions have been reported in vaccine-related regulatory meetings in the U.S. after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took over as the head of the Department of Health and Human Services earlier this month.
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