Beware Fauci's scheme to empower the World Health Organization

When the next pandemic hits, President Joe Biden wants the World Health Organization -- a puppet of the Chinese Communist Party -- to have more power over the U.S. and other countries. Among other changes, WHO is pushing for "equity" in access to vaccines and medicines, meaning the U.S. will be hindered from rushing new vaccines and treatments to its own population until poor countries are supplied, never mind who develops and pays for the drugs. Should the U.S. surrender its ability to care for its own population for the sake of global "equity"? The answer is no.

Anthony Fauci, Biden's top delegate to WHO, is behind the dangerous idea of enlarging WHO's power. We should all vigorously oppose it.

WHO lost its credibility early in 2020, when COVID struck outside China. WHO parroted China's false denials about human transmission, delayed declaring a global health emergency and advised against travel restrictions -- all in service to Beijing, instead of offering unbiased advice to the world. Georgetown University professor and globalist Lawrence Gostin said the agency and its director-general were "caught in an awfully difficult position between what science dictates and a very, very powerful country." Nonsense. The morally correct course was obvious, but WHO kowtowed to China instead, jeopardizing millions of lives.

No wonder President Donald Trump moved to sever connections with WHO. But Biden reengaged them on his first day as president, putting Fauci in charge of rejoining WHO. Fauci, in turn, promised the move would produce transparency on COVID's origins and reform of the agency. So far, there have been no answers and no reform. WHO keeps taking America's money while taking orders from China.

WHO's pro-China bias was on display last week at its annual meeting in Geneva. WHO spurned the U.S.' request to admit Taiwan as an observer -- on orders from Beijing.

WHO also reelected Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus for another term. He ran unopposed. The U.S. made no attempt to replace him, despite his subservience to China at the expense of America's safety and well-being. Why? Misplaced loyalties. Ghebreyesus calls Fauci "my brother," and Fauci considers Tedros "my dear friend." American interests be damned.

Even more troubling, the assembly voted to begin revising its regulations, which spell out a country's legal obligations if a disease outbreak could spread internationally.

It's unclear how the revisions might impede the U.S. from making decisions about travel bans and other issues. But Reuters already reported one red flag: African nations supported the revision effort only after being guaranteed vaccine and therapeutics "equity" for poor countries. Tedros has been pushing "equity" since 2020, insisting that wealthy countries should not be permitted to meet the needs of their own populations before sharing with underdeveloped nations.

As troubling as Taiwan's exclusion, Tedros' reelection and the proposed rule changes are, the worst is WHO's failure to produce information on COVID's origins. The first WHO-sponsored investigation allowed China to dictate the terms, barring access to Chinese doctors and patients' medical records and discounting evidence of a lab leak. Fauci has touted WHO's promise of a second investigation and report, but so far, it's come to nothing.

Fauci and Biden seem willing to forget 1 million American deaths from COVID, but the rest of us want answers. There should be no cooperation with WHO or funding for WHO until we get them.

WHO "failed the American people and the world by working hand in hand with the Chinese Communist Party to conceal the origins of COVID-19," said Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.).

Congressional Republicans launched measures last week to block further entanglements with WHO. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) introduced legislation mandating that any new agreement with WHO be deemed a treaty requiring advice and consent of the Senate. Meanwhile, several House Republicans demanded Biden explain capitulation to Tedros' reelection.

The world needs a global institution to man an early-warning system, track disease outbreaks and coordinate an international response. WHO is disqualified from that role. Biden is endangering our health security by entrusting it to Fauci and his WHO cronies.

Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York.