Rational discourse having become virtually impossible on the platform previously known as Twitter, which is increasingly dominated by mind-numbingly repetitive and seemingly unchallengeable memes, I today start an occasional series which I will call the ‘De-Memeinator’.
It will not require any great effort of proof on my part to show that the WHO is dominated by private interests: first and foremost among them, equally needless to say, being Bill Gates. This is established fact, at least on X, having been established by the ceaseless repetition of memes like this one.
“The WHO is sustained by private donations, the bulk of which are made by pharmaceutical and biotech corporations,” the presumably computer-generated voice declaims, before the odd video moves on to what are in fact completely unrelated matters.
But the problem is that the notion that the WHO is largely funded by private sources is not only demonstrably false, but also wildly misleading. Private interests strictly speaking, i.e., the corporations alluded to in the video, only account for a miniscule part of the WHO budget; and even if we add in funding from philanthropies like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the private contribution to the WHO budget is still dwarfed by public funding, i.e., funding from member states and other international organisations.
The entire ‘the-WHO-is-owned-by-private-interests’ meme is based on nothing more than a conflation of ‘voluntary’ and ‘private’. Yes, the WHO budget largely depends on voluntary contributions: voluntary funding accounts for nearly 90% of all WHO funding. But who ever said that this voluntary funding comes from private sources? Some of it does, but most of it does not. Most of it comes from the very same member states who are also required to make assessed contributions to the WHO budget, but who may, as they see fit, voluntarily contribute more.
Consider the below chart, which shows the leading sources of “specified” voluntary contributions to the WHO budget for the 2020-2021 biennium, i.e., essentially the Covid period. The “specified” voluntary contributions make up the great bulk of all voluntary contributions to the WHO budget and also confer the greatest influence over the organisation, since they are earmarked for specific uses. ‘Thematic’ voluntary contributions, as the name implies, are earmarked for specific areas and thus also confer influence; whereas ‘core’ voluntary contributions are unearmarked, going into the core budget, and hence are tantamount to charitable donations.
As can be seen, whereas the Gates Foundation was unsurprisingly a major source of specified voluntary funds, it was not the leading source of them. The leading source of specified voluntary funding during the Covid biennium – as should come as a surprise to those who have been misled by the meme under discussion – was rather the member state Germany.
And before anyone – ‘thinking in memes’ – tells me that, well, GAVI is essentially a Gates organisation and GAVI plus the Gates Foundation still provided more voluntary funding than Germany, please have a look at the below breakdown of GAVI’s own funding for the current funding period. Contrary to what one would be led to believe by the ‘Gates-is-GAVI’ meme, GAVI receives the great bulk of its own funding from public sources and German funding even of GAVI outstrips Gates funding.
During the Covid biennium, Germany was also the leading provider of ‘thematic’ voluntary funding to the WHO, as can be seen in the below chart. The German-dominated and itself largely German-funded European Union, under the leadership of the former German Minister of Defence Ursula von der Leyen, was the second largest provider of ‘thematic’ funding. (It was the sixth largest provider of ‘specified’ funding.) The Gates Foundation did not provide any ‘thematic’ funding.
On the other hand, Germany provided literally zero non-earmarked – so to say, purely disinterested – ‘core’ voluntary funding. (The leading provider of ‘core’ voluntary funding during the Covid biennium was the United Kingdom.)
Furthermore, as I have shown in my earlier article here, whereas most of the Gates Foundation funding during the Covid biennium continued to be earmarked for the same use to which Gates funding had always been devoted, namely polio eradication, virtually all of the German voluntary funding went precisely to the COVID-19 response. The Gates Foundation provided veritable peanuts for the latter purpose: roughly $25 million in all as compared to the roughly $830 million – 33 times more – which Germany poured into the COVID-19 response budget. (The relevant funding data can be found here.)
Were it not for the effects of the ‘the-WHO-is-owned-by-private-interests’ meme, this massive influx of German money ought to raise questions about Germany’s motivations. This is especially so since Germany had not been a leading provider of voluntary funding in the past and since the German Government also just happens to have sponsored the mRNA drug developer BioNTech and the BioNTech vaccine, which would be made the very focal point of the COVID-19 response, at least in the West.
A recent analysis of voluntary WHO funding by Iwunna et al. found that private funding of the WHO has in fact been declining and that the contribution of private corporations accounted for just 1% of all voluntary contributions in 2020. Note that this means that the contributions of private corporations account for less than 1% of the WHO budget overall, since the total budget consists of both voluntary and assessed contributions. The contributions of private philanthropies like the Gates Foundation accounted for 17% of all voluntary contributions in 2020.
Thus, only 18% of all voluntary funding came from unambiguously ‘private’ sources. As can be seen in the below graph from Iwunna et al., the remaining 82% came either directly from the member states themselves (55%) or from other UN agencies besides the WHO, other international organisations like the European Union, international financial institutions like the World Bank, public-private ‘partnerships’ like GAVI – which, as the above graph makes clear, are themselves overwhelmingly dependent precisely on public sources of funding – and NGOs, which likewise largely depend on public sponsors such as the EU for their funding.
In short, it is fair to conclude that roughly 80% of all voluntary WHO funding comes precisely from public sources: either WHO members states or international institutions and other organisations which are themselves funded by states.
Furthermore, since, per Iwunna et al.’s calculations, 12% of the WHO budget is still funded by assessed contributions, this means that roughly 90% of the WHO budget overall is funded, either directly or indirectly, by states.
So, why is it a well-established fact on X that precisely the opposite is the case, that the WHO is ‘owned’ by private interests? What is going on? Was not the whole point of Elon Musk’s famous dictum ‘freedom of speech is not freedom of reach’ to contain misinformation? In pledging fealty to the EU’s Digital Services Act, did Musk not promise that ‘Community Notes’ would be “transformational” in this regard?
When has a ‘Community Note’ ever corrected the misinformation represented by the ‘the-WHO-is-owned-by-private-interests’ meme? And why should the ‘Community’ – whatever that is – even be required to intervene? Should it not be possible for individual users to address factually incorrect or misleading claims and for these challenges to gain visibility, thus correcting misinformation the old-fashioned way, viz. through dialogue and debate?
But apparently this is not possible. My own modest attempt at addressing the post cited at the outset of this article and pointing out the confusion between ‘private’ and ‘voluntary’ received no engagement, other than a ‘like’ from a sexbot, until I reposted it myself to my followers.
Why does blatant misinformation trend on X, whereas incontrovertible facts languish in obscurity? Either we have simply to despair for humanity or the X algorithm must be making this happen.
Robert Kogon is the pen name of a widely-published journalist covering European affairs. Subscribe to his Substack.
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No outbreak just power play.
o/t a bit but ?
Wow.
This could do with further investigation.
Was a comment on the Mail article linked to for this page.
What I find fascinating is that they keep telling us that gain of function research is vital because we need to learn how to defend ourselves against super viruses, but in the meantime lab grown viruses are more commonplace than actual viruses.
More commonly dangerous, our entire evolution has been predicated on surviving attack from natural viri but that is why novel manmade ones are potentially so dangerous.
Not a scientist, just sayin .
that they keep telling us that gain of function research is vital
For “gain-of-function”, read “biological warfare”.
I think this will turn out to be the truth, but what is Faucis gain as a traitor?
As far as can be seen his institute contributed a measly $600,000 towards research, that is known about.
I don’t think you can take anything China says at face value.
I’d imagine this is about making the world terrified once more.
Does China have permission for this latest outbreak because Lord Bill of the Gates of Hell has said his next pandemic will be smallpox?
Most outbreaks happening in Inner Mongolia and Manchuria, not densely populated and not Han Chinese either
Not Chinese at all from their perspective.
The Uigers seem to be getting it easy, probably because lots of them are already locked up for re-education.
Same Goes for the Tibetans. Not Chinese, minority in their own country because forced Sinification
Free Tibet!
Much like March 2020, China claim they’re having an outbreak and having to lock down in order to convince the useful idiots in the west that they need to do the same.
Staggeringly, the unvaccinated are now being blamed for all cause excess mortality!
UNREAL! Look who Health Minister blames CCP Lockdown Deaths for!
Tomorrow’s headline, COP26 mandates compulsory covid vaccination to tackle climate change.
China’s role in the fraud has been to provide the optics; If China claims to be in the midst of a deadly outbreak, then it’s because the pandemic narrative needs a boost in the US. Cue footage of extreme containment measures, hazmat suits and whole city streets being disinfected. Cameras rolling, ACTION!
🎥
When the revolution comes, the revolting masses need to forget the politicians & cut the head off the chicken, go for the billionaires!
Talking of animal farm… dis funneey!
https://twitter.com/SheepNewsTV/status/1457633851333873665?s=20
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWzG9sFlFHE
‘You Can Deny It All You Want’: Rand Paul Rips Fauci Over Gain-Of-Function Research
Things could always be worse for us British purebloods.We could be in Austria. We could be in Lithuania. We could be in Victoria. We could be in China.
Fake News?
Dr. Reiner Fuellmich- The Corona Plandemic and the International Legal Approach Lawyer’s Committee for 9/11 Inquiry
Summarizes his case.
Oh my. I sure hope no government follows their lead in locking people down. It doesn’t seem to work very well. Hope someone at the WHO and Westminster take note.
The ongoing COVID-19 nonsense here in the United States exists solely and exclusively because our governments have failed to use the correct treatment. They used so-called “vaccines” when Japan has just proven, in less than ONE MONTH, that Ivermectin can wipe out the disease. IVM was awarded the Nobel prize for medicine in 2015. One of the 3 most important drugs in human history: Aspirin, Penicillin, and Ivermectin. Get your Ivermectin today while you still can! https://ivmpharmacy.com
Lol. Anyone not seeing this for what it is (“lockdowns are not enough, we need to vaccinate everyone and their dog”) is daydreaming.
Unraveling the lies of the pandemic one by one – with PANDA co-founder Nick Hudson
https://youtu.be/OHtQ1JRoTOs
You’d have thought this was made within the last eighteen months, not four years ago:
YOU JUST WANT PEOPLE TO DIE
https://youtu.be/eXWhbUUE4ko
Can we believe anything in the media these days, editing is just too good.
Hmm. This delta variant seems to be hanging around a lot longer than the other variants…
Looks like the CCP is oriental equivalent of nutty New Zealand and over-the-top Oz when it comes to COVID. All this kerfuffle over a total, out of a population of nearly one and a half billion, of 62 alleged infections, according to the latest Worldometers COVID report. Funny how, irrespective, of their alleged political ideologies, they’re all singing off the same authoritarian songsheet – presumably with lyrics courtesy of Herr Schwab and the oligarchs running the Great Reset.
I doubtthe Daily Gawp bothered to publish this graphic, which shows the horrendous death toll from the resurgent plague now supposedly ravaging the Communist superstate (which, since they kicked off the pandemic in early 2020, has produced far more billionaires than the US and UK combined!)
Wow, 65 new cases. There’s more people in my town of 15k people who’ve got it at the moment, and it’s otherwise business as usual here. Just goes to show what happens when you bully and coerce a naive, weak public into doing as the authorities want, whatever the reality of the situation.
PS. My area has had more people die in road traffic accidents over the past month than of COVID. Let that sink in.