an global health make progress amid rupture?” This is the question underlying the annual opening briefing for the 79th World Health Assembly in Geneva. This year’s formal agenda seeks to answer that question through four thematic pillars: provide health (non–communicable disease, communicable disease, mental health, and universal health coverage); protect health (health emergency preparedness); promote health (wellbeing and health promotion for all); and power & performance (integrating equity analysis—especially gender—into performance reviews of WHA initiatives). Answering the question well will be a challenge for global health and wellbeing leaders gathering in Geneva, with global volatility creating acute challenges on the ground, as well as structural political and financing challenges.
Context
This is a difficult time for the World Health Assembly (WHA), the governing body of the World Health Organization(WHO). The United States and Argentina have both formally withdrawn from the WHO. The WHO’s budget has a 45% gap for 2026–2027. The Pandemic Agreement is faltering, though not dead. The Iran war is creating new on–the–ground health emergencies. There are important, substantive items on the agenda—and a promise of progress as official attention is increasingly paid to self–care and wellbeing as critical components of universal health coverage. This gathering will also witness the start of election campaigns for the WHO’s next Director General. There is a lot of work to be done. Yet aside from acute challenges in financing, political disunity, and conflict, there is growing concern about the future of work to reform global health architecture and the role of multilateral health institutions in the years to come.
What’s on the agenda
Heading into WHA79 in Geneva on May 18–23, here’s what to expect:
The future of multilateral health governance is unclear. Against the backdrop of the formal withdrawal from the WHO by the U.S. and Argentina, WHA79 has been tasked with launching a formal review of the global health architecture. That reform process is already controversial; language recently inserted into the governing resolution could constrain the WHO’s agency in enacting reform. This, and a marked increase in bilateral health agreements, have led advocates of multilateral approaches searching for answers. With major economies like Brazil, China, India, and Indonesia failing to sign the April 07 Joint Political Declaration on the Reform of the Global Health Architecture, those answers may need to be creative.
WHO’s funding crisis grows. The WHO previously trimmed its 2026–2027 budget significantly, to $4.2 billion from $5.3 billion. Even for this scaled down budget, there are serious shortfalls, with a nearly $1.9 billion funding gap to meet this budget. But there are deeper structural issues. A more general collapse in overseas direct aid in 2025 will have lasting repercussions, and WHO member states are giving the WHO less flexibility in designing how its funds can be spent (assessed contributions, which give the most flexible funding, fell to 17% of the base budget).
The Pandemic Agreement is stalled. The WHO Pandemic Agreement was adopted at WHA78, but cannot be implemented until the Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing annex is finalized. While progress has been made on the annex, negotiations collapsed in advance of a May 2 deadline. Politically, there is a regional divide as stakeholders in wealthier countries blocked proposals by governments of the Global South for mandatory benefit sharing. The deadline for agreement can be extended, but at the least this means the Pandemic Agreement will not enter into force until at least 2027. Rising anxiety over a Hantavirus outbreak is a reminder of how important this agreement can be.
Proliferating conflict makes everything harder. Conflict in Southwest Asia is creating an acute health emergency that goes well beyond the immediate region. Global supply chains took another hit from the stoppage of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, hampering both aid delivery and medtech supply chains.
Health is personal…and political. More important given budgetary constraints and the complication of conflict, the WHA79 agenda suggests an evolution of how health is carried out. Item 15.2 on the agenda focuses on wellbeing and directly addresses loneliness as a driver of poor health. Member states are considering a strategy that would reframe health as an economic investment rather than an expenditure. And a core component of the Lyon Declaration is the idea of empowerment of communities and national systems with primary care interventions at its center.
What they’re saying
In response to funding cuts, WHO is supporting many countries to sustain essential health services, and to transition away from aid dependency. — WHO Director General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus
In Africa we are not facing a single outbreak. Countries are responding to multiple health emergencies at the same time... and currently we have 21 countries facing a humanitarian situation. — WHO Africa Region Emergency Director Dr. Marie Roseline Belizaire
We've got one shipment that was supposed to be delivered into East Africa, which is now blocked... I haven't seen before such a perfect storm. — International Rescue Committee VP Emergencies & Humanitarian Action Bob Kitchen
We know, for example, in self-care, it today saves the system $120 billion annually, and that's only in a handful of countries we can measure. — Bayer Senior Vice President & Global Head of Public Affairs, Market Access & Sustainability Daniella Foster
Editor’s note: The quote by Daniella Foster originated at the Health Systems We Build Together Signal Salon, on the occasion of the 2026 IMF–World Bank Spring Meetings. Quote published with permission.
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At WHA79, redesigning global health architecture amid rupture
Photo via Adobe Stock.
May 18, 2026
The agenda for the World Health Assembly is substantive this year, with a formal review of the very multilateral health architecture the WHO operates within. Yet meaningful progress will be challenged by external crises alongside growing budgetary and political constraints.
C
an global health make progress amid rupture?” This is the question underlying the annual opening briefing for the 79th World Health Assembly in Geneva. This year’s formal agenda seeks to answer that question through four thematic pillars: provide health (non–communicable disease, communicable disease, mental health, and universal health coverage); protect health (health emergency preparedness); promote health (wellbeing and health promotion for all); and power & performance (integrating equity analysis—especially gender—into performance reviews of WHA initiatives). Answering the question well will be a challenge for global health and wellbeing leaders gathering in Geneva, with global volatility creating acute challenges on the ground, as well as structural political and financing challenges.
Context
This is a difficult time for the World Health Assembly (WHA), the governing body of the World Health Organization(WHO). The United States and Argentina have both formally withdrawn from the WHO. The WHO’s budget has a 45% gap for 2026–2027. The Pandemic Agreement is faltering, though not dead. The Iran war is creating new on–the–ground health emergencies. There are important, substantive items on the agenda—and a promise of progress as official attention is increasingly paid to self–care and wellbeing as critical components of universal health coverage. This gathering will also witness the start of election campaigns for the WHO’s next Director General. There is a lot of work to be done. Yet aside from acute challenges in financing, political disunity, and conflict, there is growing concern about the future of work to reform global health architecture and the role of multilateral health institutions in the years to come.
What’s on the agenda
Heading into WHA79 in Geneva on May 18–23, here’s what to expect:
The future of multilateral health governance is unclear. Against the backdrop of the formal withdrawal from the WHO by the U.S. and Argentina, WHA79 has been tasked with launching a formal review of the global health architecture. That reform process is already controversial; language recently inserted into the governing resolution could constrain the WHO’s agency in enacting reform. This, and a marked increase in bilateral health agreements, have led advocates of multilateral approaches searching for answers. With major economies like Brazil, China, India, and Indonesia failing to sign the April 07 Joint Political Declaration on the Reform of the Global Health Architecture, those answers may need to be creative.
WHO’s funding crisis grows. The WHO previously trimmed its 2026–2027 budget significantly, to $4.2 billion from $5.3 billion. Even for this scaled down budget, there are serious shortfalls, with a nearly $1.9 billion funding gap to meet this budget. But there are deeper structural issues. A more general collapse in overseas direct aid in 2025 will have lasting repercussions, and WHO member states are giving the WHO less flexibility in designing how its funds can be spent (assessed contributions, which give the most flexible funding, fell to 17% of the base budget).
The Pandemic Agreement is stalled. The WHO Pandemic Agreement was adopted at WHA78, but cannot be implemented until the Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing annex is finalized. While progress has been made on the annex, negotiations collapsed in advance of a May 2 deadline. Politically, there is a regional divide as stakeholders in wealthier countries blocked proposals by governments of the Global South for mandatory benefit sharing. The deadline for agreement can be extended, but at the least this means the Pandemic Agreement will not enter into force until at least 2027. Rising anxiety over a Hantavirus outbreak is a reminder of how important this agreement can be.
Proliferating conflict makes everything harder. Conflict in Southwest Asia is creating an acute health emergency that goes well beyond the immediate region. Global supply chains took another hit from the stoppage of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, hampering both aid delivery and medtech supply chains.
Health is personal…and political. More important given budgetary constraints and the complication of conflict, the WHA79 agenda suggests an evolution of how health is carried out. Item 15.2 on the agenda focuses on wellbeing and directly addresses loneliness as a driver of poor health. Member states are considering a strategy that would reframe health as an economic investment rather than an expenditure. And a core component of the Lyon Declaration is the idea of empowerment of communities and national systems with primary care interventions at its center.
What they’re saying
In response to funding cuts, WHO is supporting many countries to sustain essential health services, and to transition away from aid dependency. — WHO Director General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus
In Africa we are not facing a single outbreak. Countries are responding to multiple health emergencies at the same time... and currently we have 21 countries facing a humanitarian situation. — WHO Africa Region Emergency Director Dr. Marie Roseline Belizaire
We've got one shipment that was supposed to be delivered into East Africa, which is now blocked... I haven't seen before such a perfect storm. — International Rescue Committee VP Emergencies & Humanitarian Action Bob Kitchen
We know, for example, in self-care, it today saves the system $120 billion annually, and that's only in a handful of countries we can measure. — Bayer Senior Vice President & Global Head of Public Affairs, Market Access & Sustainability Daniella Foster
Editor’s note: The quote by Daniella Foster originated at the Health Systems We Build Together Signal Salon, on the occasion of the 2026 IMF–World Bank Spring Meetings. Quote published with permission.
