reduce the scale of our work and workforce

[noumoe]

Three months after President Donald Trump signed an executive order withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO) - they're now suffering from a 'large salary gap' and have 'no choice but to reduce the scale of our work and workforce' with 'significant' layoffs, according to AFP, citing director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Of note, the WHO has received over $3.5 billion from US taxpayers since 2010.

In Trump's Jan. 20 order halting US funding from the United Nations body, the president cited WHO's "mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic that arose out of Wuhan, China," as well as other global health concerns. It was Trump’s second attempt to withdraw from the WHO - the first being in 2020 over the WHO’s complicity in China’s coverup of details surrounding the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to Tedros, "The refusal of the US to pay its assessed contributions for 2024 and 2025, combined with reductions in official development assistance by some other countries, means we are facing a salary gap for the 2026–27 biennium of between $560 and $650 million."

The lower end of that spectrum "represents about 25 percent of staff costs," he continued, adding that "that doesn't necessarily mean a 25-percent cut to the number of positions."