The WHO in the Age of the Coronavirus

The responses of states and the WHO to the COVID-19 pandemic reveal the considerable weaknesses of international organizations. Although the Trump administration has misdiagnosed theWHO’s ills, theWHOhas indeed failed to meet the public health threat posed by the coronavirus. The WHO’s responses to the current crisis demonstrate that it shares five disorders common to other UN system expert-driven organizations: overdependence on states; singular reliance on “managerial” approaches to enforcement; inflexible emergency declarations; absence of regularized systems for inter-regime collaboration; and common bureaucratic pathologies.