Taiwanese minister: China is playing politics with health

A general view pictured during the 70th World Health Assembly, at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, Monday, May 22, 2017. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

Taiwan’s health minister yesterday accused China of playing politics with health after Taiwan was blocked from taking part in the annual meeting of the governing body of the World Health Organization for the first time since 2008.

Health and Welfare Minister Chen Shih-chung lashed out at China’s actions, which Beijing said was taken because Taiwan’s year-old government has reneged on the “One China” principle.

“Are we here to discuss politics, or are we here to discuss health?” Chen told supporters and journalists. “I think that all discussion should be based on the right to health, instead of anything political.”

The World Health Assembly accepted the exclusion of Taiwan without a vote at the beginning of its annual session in Geneva. Taiwan isn’t a U.N. member state, but had been granted assembly “observer status” every year since 2009 under an arrangement on the “One China” principle.

On Sunday, Chen’s Chinese counterpart, Li Bin, blamed the governing party of Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen for the exclusion of Taiwan this year, insisting its refusal to accept the principle of a single China has torpedoed its hopes to attend.

Chen struck back at that claim.

“Since President Tsai took office, we have not done anything to proactively change the status quo,” he said, expressing “disappointment” about Li’s comments. He added he would not rule out a meeting with Li in Geneva, but that nothing was yet planned.

Chen said Taiwan has “many things to share” in the health arena.

“We have a full-coverage national health care insurance policy, high-quality medical care, powerful epidemic control, and many other successful initiatives,” Chen said. “It is not only that Taiwan needs the WHO, the WHO also needs Taiwan.”

The World Health Assembly, now in its 70th edition, brings together health ministers and other top health officials from its 194 member states. The highlight of this year is expected to be the election today of a successor for Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan, a native of Hong Kong who has led the agency for a decade.

A statement yesterday from the office of U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said he had met with health officials from Taiwan “to discuss mutual efforts in support of global health security” — one of many bilateral meetings he has planned in Geneva.

Before taking office in January, President-elect Donald Trump — now Price’s boss — astonished many by talking directly with President Tsai by phone, the highest level U.S.-Taiwan conversation since Washington switched diplomatic recognition to Beijing in 1979. Trump further stirred the pot by questioning the need to uphold the longtime U.S. “One China” policy.

Trump has since moved to reassure Beijing that he will adhere to that policy.

China has used its clout as one of five veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council to exclude Taiwan from the United Nations and other world bodies that require sovereign status for membership. Jamey Keaten, Geneva, AP

Exclusive | Health agency spends more on travel than AIDS

Margaret Chan (left) General Director of the World Health Organization (WHO)

Dr. Margaret Chan, director-general of the World Health Organization, traveled to Guinea earlier this month to join the country’s president in celebrating the world’s first Ebola vaccine.

After praising health workers in West Africa for their triumph over the lethal virus, Chan spent the night in the top-tier presidential suite at the beach-side Palm Camayenne hotel. The suite, equipped with marble bathrooms and a dining room that seats eight, has an advertised price of 900 euros (USD1,008) per night.

Some say such luxurious accommodations send the wrong message to the rest of WHO’s 7,000 staffers.

According to internal documents obtained by The Associated Press, the United Nations health agency routinely has spent about $200 million a year on travel expenses, more than what it doles out to fight some of the biggest problems in public health, including AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined.

Last year, WHO spent about $71 million on AIDS and hepatitis. It devoted $61 million to malaria. To slow the spread of tuberculosis, WHO invested $59 million. Still, some health programs do get exceptional funding — the agency spends about $450 million trying to wipe out polio every year.

WHO declined to say if it paid for Chan’s stay at the Palm Camayenne in Conakry, but noted that host countries sometimes pick up the tab for her hotels.

At a time when the cash-strapped health agency is pleading for more money to fund its responses to health crises worldwide, it has struggled to get its travel costs under control. Senior officials have complained internally that U.N. staffers break new rules that were introduced to try to curb its expansive travel spending, booking perks like business class airplane tickets and rooms in five-star hotels with few consequences.

“We don’t trust people to do the right thing when it comes to travel,” Nick Jeffreys, WHO’s director of finance, said during a September 2015 in-house seminar on accountability — a video of which was obtained by the AP. Maria Cheng, London, AP