Perceptions of international organizations

'United Nations agencies like the World Health Organization are constantly painted in a bad light by the more extreme conservative elements of the Catholic Church here in the Philippines.'

ANTI-RH fundamentalists appear to be schizophrenic about international scientific bodies and their role in assessing evidence on biological processes and their effects on health.

This was apparent during the legislative debates as well as in the third RH hearing of the Supreme Court last week.

On the one hand they repeatedly cited a World Health Organization (WHO) body, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), to warn about the harmful effects of contraceptives. On the other, they constantly downplayed WHO opinions about the safety and efficacy of contraceptive devices and pills.

The likely explanation for such confusion is a lack of knowledge concerning the origins, history, and roles of international agencies in the conduct of international activities.

WHO for example is a specialized agency of the United Nations with technical authority on international health matters. While it functions as a part of the United Nations System, as an intergovernmental agency, WHO has a separate charter with its own set of governing bodies.

The World Health Assembly that meets annually in Geneva is WHO's highest governing body. It is composed of the Ministers of Health or their representatives of the organization's more than 190 Member States. The Assembly exercises its authority through an Executive Board comprising 36 public health or biomedical experts nominated on a rotating basis by the Member States themselves.

Day to day operations are carried out by a Secretariat of technical and health management experts supported by general service staff stationed at headquarters in Geneva, the six Regional Offices, and at country offices.

The main source of WHO's technical strength is its access to international technical bodies (such as IARC) and the health expertise of its Member States' health authorities as well as their academic and science institutions in all areas relevant to its mandate.

From time to time and for special purposes, WHO convenes expert panels drawn from the global scientific community to supplement in-house capacities. Thus, WHO opinions on specific issues are distillations of the consensus of such bodies and reflect views from a broad range of public, biomedical, social, and other highly specialized disciplines.

WHO's regular budget is funded through assessed contributions of Member States pro-rated according to the member's population and level of socio-economic development. Some countries also make contributions to special extra-budgetary programs. The funding arrangements render it improbable that financial pressure can be brought to bear on its scientific decision making processes.

Although agencies like WHO are sensitive to political and even religious sensibilities of its Member States, its structure and manner of working make it highly unlikely that its conclusions can be biased in favor of any one member or group of members.

The Organization's position on reproductive health for example has been consistent with all the global consensus-driven declarations particularly the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994 where the term reproductive health was first introduced.

The Vatican's status in the World Health Assembly is that of "observer" - meaning it has no vote but can participate in debates and discussions. However, it influences international health policy through its political leverage in countries with predominantly Catholic populations. Historically, the Vatican strongly resisted incorporating population and family planning issues in the Organization's agenda from its inception in 1947. Nevertheless, the Vatican supports WHO initiatives in other areas such as addressing children's health problems in poor countries.

The WHO Regional Office for the Western Pacific was established here in Manila in 1949. The majority of its general service staff is Filipino. A number of Filipino health experts have served in high-ranking technical and administrative posts in the Secretariat here, in other Regional Offices, and in Geneva. Additionally, Filipinos have participated extensively in special panels, technical working groups, and scientific working groups - making significant contributions to WHO achievements such as the global eradication of smallpox and the more recent eradication of polio in the Western Pacific.

It is unfortunate that United Nations agencies like the World Health Organization are constantly painted in a bad light by the more extreme conservative elements of the Catholic Church here in the Philippines. What is even more regrettable is that, as a result, even some educated Filipinos are not informed about the important role that agencies such as WHO, UNFPA, and UNICEF play to improve health conditions in developing countries like the Philippines.

Hopefully, as the heated debates on reproductive health are gradually replaced by more rational sober discussions on universal health care for all Filipinos, there will be broader cooperation between secular health institutions and the more enlightened elements of the Catholic Church in the Philippines.

source: www.malaya.com.ph