US experts said the sudden pause came as a surprise and would set back efforts to contain health threats abroad.
US public health officials have been told to stop working with the World Health Organization (WHO), effective immediately, as the Trump administration prepares for the US withdrawal from the organisation.
A US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official, John Nkengasong, sent a memo to senior leaders at the agency on Sunday night telling them that all staff who work with the WHO must immediately stop their collaborations and “await further guidance”.
The Associated Press viewed a copy of Nkengasong’s memo, which said the stop-work policy applied to “all CDC staff engaging with WHO through technical working groups, coordinating centers, advisory boards, cooperative agreements or other means – in person or virtual”.
It also says CDC staff are not allowed to visit WHO offices.
Experts said the sudden stoppage was a surprise and would set back work on investigating and trying to stop outbreaks of Marburg virus and mpox in Africa, as well as brewing threats such as bird flu outbreaks.
“People thought there would be a slow withdrawal. This has really caught everyone with their pants down,” said Dr Jeffrey Klausner, a University of Southern California public health expert who collaborates with WHO on work against sexually transmitted infections.
Trump’s retreat from global health initiatives
It also comes as US President Donald Trump takes other steps to retreat from the global health sphere.
He has also reinstated the Mexico City Policy – which bans the US from funding foreign groups that perform or offer information on abortions – and frozen funding for PEPFAR (the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), which provides HIV medication to more than 20 million people.
Last week, Trump began the process of withdrawing the US from WHO, though the pullout will not take immediate effect and the US must meet its financial obligations for the year.
That means the immediate end to WHO-CDC contact is “a big problem,” said Klausner, who said he learned of the communication ban from someone at CDC.
The collaboration allows the US to learn about new tests, new treatments, and emerging outbreaks – information “which can help us protect Americans abroad and at home,” Klausner said.
The CDC details nearly 30 people to WHO, and sends many millions of dollars to it through cooperative agreements.
The US agency also has some of the world’s leading experts in infectious diseases and public health threats, and the two agencies’ staffers are in daily contact about health dangers and how to stop them.
A US health official confirmed that the CDC was stopping its work with WHO, while the WHO declined to comment and the CDC declined to make Nkengasong available for an interview.
