Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced that the United States has formally withdrawn from the World Health Organization, saying the move was taken to reclaim American sovereignty and remove U.S. public health policy from what he described as a failed international system.

“Hi, I'm Robert F Kennedy Jr, your HHS Secretary,” Kennedy said.

“On Thursday, the United States formally withdrew from the World Health Organization. We made this decision to reclaim our independence, to protect American sovereignty, and to free our public health policy from a system that no longer serves the American people.”

Kennedy said the World Health Organization had strayed from its original mission and no longer operates in the interests of transparency or accountability.

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“The World Health Organization has lost its way,” he said.

“It's drifted far from its founding mission, and it's become mired in bureaucracy, in conflicts of interest and in international power politics.”

He said those failures became especially evident during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“During the covid pandemic, those failures weren't just abstract, they were deadly,” Kennedy said.

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“The world watched as transparency collapsed, accountability disappeared, and ordinary citizens paid the price. That hasn't changed, and it isn't improving.”

Kennedy credited President Donald Trump with initiating the withdrawal early in his second term.

“President Trump recognized the problems with who immediately,” Kennedy said.

“In fact, one of his very first executive orders of his second term, began the formal process of withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization.”

Kennedy described that decision as a clear shift in how American health policy would be governed.

“It was an early, decisive signal that American health policy would answer to the American people and not to foreign bureaucracies,” he said.

He said the administration is now completing the withdrawal process and redirecting focus toward domestic and independent public health capabilities.

“Today, we're completing that action protecting Americans here at home and abroad is our top priority,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy said the Department of Health and Human Services has taken steps to strengthen preparedness without reliance on international institutions.

“That's why my team at HHS working closely with HHS career civil servants and scientists and the State Department has strengthened our biosecurity, upgraded disease surveillance, improved outbreak preparedness and expanded the rapid response capabilities or any public Health Emergency wherever it begins,” he said.

He added that outside organizations are not necessary for the United States to carry out those responsibilities.

“We don't need outside institutions to do that,” Kennedy said.

Looking ahead, Kennedy said U.S. interaction with the World Health Organization will be limited strictly to finalizing the withdrawal.

“Going forward, US engagement with the who will be limited solely to completing our withdrawal and safeguarding the health and safety of the American people,” he said.

Kennedy confirmed that financial and personnel ties to the organization have already been severed.

“All us, funding has ended,” he said.

“All government US personnel have stopped working there.”

Despite the withdrawal, Kennedy said the United States will continue to play a leading role in global health.

“I believe this deeply that only the United States has the scale, the innovation and the leadership to drive global health solutions that put people first, starting with our own citizens,” he said.

He emphasized that stepping away from the World Health Organization does not mean stepping back from global responsibility.

“Although we are withdrawing from the WHO America will never withdraw from its leadership in global health,” Kennedy said.

“America will continue to lead.”

Kennedy said that leadership would be grounded in specific principles.

“We will lead with science, with integrity and with transparency and with accountability,” he said.

He concluded by dedicating the decision to Americans impacted by pandemic-era policies.

“And let me say this clearly for the Americans who died alone in nursing homes, the small businesses that were destroyed by reckless mandates, the families whose lives were upended by unelected foreign officials who never answered to them,” Kennedy said.

“This decision is for you.”

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