02/07/2010 Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
The Director General of the World Health Organisation Margaret Chan has told PACE rapporteur Paul Flynn (United Kingdom, SOC) that she “welcomes criticism” when it helps her organisation to improve its performance, and pledged a “transparent and independent” review of how the WHO handled the H1N1 pandemic.
“The WHO needs people to fully understand its work,” said Dr Chan, meeting Mr Flynn, who is PACE’s rapporteur on the handling of the pandemic, today in . They agreed that “when difficult decisions need to be taken in the midst of profound uncertainty, all views should be lened to and taken into account”.
Dr Chan said the WHO fully respected the views of parliamentarians, and outlined recent efforts to encourage greater involvement of parliamentarians in its meetings. She said she looked forward to working with PACE “in the common interest of better global public health”, pointing out that her organisation and the Council of Europe shared the same values of equity and social justice.
Earlier in the day, Mr Flynn presented a number of the Assembly’s criticisms of how the WHO handled the H1N1 pandemic when he testified before the International Health Regulations Review Committee, set up to advise on how the response to future pandemics can be improved.
In a 24 June resolution, PACE made a series of urgent recommendations for greater transparency and better governance in public health, as well as safeguards against what it called “undue influence by vested interests”.