Who are the WHO, CDC & FDA Working for?


Rich donors are undermining WHO, say civil society groups



http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Rich-donors-are-undermining-WHO-say-civil-society-groups/articleshow/47349863.cms


Can CDC in the US takings millions from pharma industry be unbiased?


How food, beverage giants influence WHO rules



India’s tightrope walk at the WHO

India has to indicate where it stands on some new but controversial issues being pushed by the powerful G7 countries led by Germany
 
D. Ravi Kanth
 http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/TWzw07my8SD52UYqzWFOkK/Indias-tightrope-walk-at-the-WHO.html
For an organization founded in 1948 to ensure the highest possible level of health, this is not a propitious time. The WHO’s current budget of over $4 billion is financed mostly from voluntary sources, with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation being the second largest donor. Nearly 75% of funds come from the US and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with conditions attached—they are to be used for specific programmes and not for addressing global public health challenges.


WHO will lead and who will pay? The World Health Organization, Ebola and the future of global health

By Andreas Vilhelmsson
Posted:



Though many PPPs have the advantage of funding and can also be cost-effective, oftentimes, the private sector and public health sector have different priorities and implementation practices. Private sector involvement in international health may skew the global community’s prioritization of issues and interventions, which may be questionable from a public health perspective. An example would be the prioritization of communicable diseases like HIV/AIDS and malaria in the global health space, which lead to non-communicable diseases and the social determinants of health receiving less resources in spite of their heavy burden.

WHO's problem

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Author(s): Vibha Varshney
Jun 30, 2015 | From the print edition
As most developed countries shy away from increasing their contribution, a cash-strapped World Health Organization is forced to rely on private sector funds. Civil society groups warn of conflict of interest
http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/whos-problem 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: protecting the private good?

BMJ 2015; 350 doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.h2362 (Published 15 May 2015) Cite this as: BMJ 2015;350:h2362 
 http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h2362

Opening up to private money

Funding of CDC took a turn in 1983, when the CDC was authorised to accept external “gifts” from industry and other private parties. In 1992, Congress passed legislation to encourage relationships between industry and the CDC by creating the non-profit CDC Foundation, which began operations in 1995.
The CDC Foundation raised $52m in fiscal year 2014, of which $12m was from corporations. The CDC itself in fiscal year 2014 received $16m in conditional funding from sources such as corporations, individuals, and philanthropy, including the CDC Foundation. Conditional donations are earmarked for specific projects. For example, in 2012, Genentech earmarked $600 000 in donations to the CDC Foundation for CDC’s efforts to promote expanded testing and treatment of viral hepatitis. Genentech and its parent company, Roche, manufacture test kits and treatments for hepatitis C.
Numerous manufacturers give donations to the CDC Foundation. Janssen also contributed $1.5m in 2012-13,1 and in 2011-12 contributors included Merck ($915 149), Genzyme ($762 000), Sanofi-Aventis ($600 000), and Abbott Laboratories ($550 000).
The CDC has recently issued controversial recommendations for screening tests and drugs,2 4 and is currently overseeing several equally controversial studies.5 Some of these are associated with “conditional” industry funding, as the three examples below show.


The Great Myth of the FDA as Protector of Our Health

 By Christina Sarich | Natural Society

 http://consciouslifenews.com/great-myth-fda-protector-health/1166653/

Just like we’ve been taught to bow to the white coats, we’ve also been conditioned to think that whatever the Food and Drug Administration approves must be safe. Nothing could be further from the truth. This organization is supposed to be a governmental watchdog over our food supply and public health, as well as an agency to keep medicines or other proposed ‘cures’ – both natural and pharmaceutical – from doing us harm. The FDA is supposed to block the interests of greedy corporations who want to make a fast buck, but its original intentions, if they were ever pure, have been tainted.

Political maneuvering, lobbying, racketeering, and outright corporate infiltration of the FDA has made the institution a complete waste of tax payer money, and worse, an absolute detriment to our overall food and medicine safety. Just because you see ‘FDA’ approved on something anymore, doesn’t mean it is safe. FDA drugs have been responsible for over 140,000 deaths in hospitals every year – some would call that an epidemic. Others go as far as to accuse the FDA of mass homicide of the American people.