World Health Organization spends more on travel than AIDS • Hacker News Board

Re: World Health Organization spends more on travel than AIDS

#21

Post by dismantlethesun » Thu, May 25, 2017, 3:26 PM UTC

mcguire wrote: post #18

" Dr. Bruce Aylward, who directed WHO’s outbreak response, racked up nearly $400,000 in travel expenses during the Ebola crisis, sometimes flying by helicopter to visit clinics instead of traveling by jeep over muddy roads, according to internal trip reports he filed. " If he needs to visit more than one site per day, the jeep is provably not workable. The next article we're likely to see is one saying the WHO had dr…

Also these are not safe areas. If you drive by road you will get stopped by bandits. It's certainly happened to me.

Re: World Health Organization spends more on travel than AIDS

#22

Post by brudgers » Thu, May 25, 2017, 3:31 PM UTC

yk wrote: post #12

And is the WHO primarily an aid agency, where very high travel costs would be a problem, or is it primarily a coordination body, where high travel costs would be the point? The article is just missing this piece of information how is the WHO supposed to work. (Next exercise for journalists, supposed according to the people who founded it, not supposed according to the guy who writes about it.) More concretely, if the…

Another expense in areas with ongoing humanitarian crises or less stable government institutions is security. It tends to be expensive.

Re: World Health Organization spends more on travel than AIDS

#23

Post by dogma1138 » Thu, May 25, 2017, 6:36 PM UTC

gus_massa wrote: post #7

Does the WHO buy most of the vaccines and treatments, or most of the countries buy their own doses? This looks like a true but misleading title, like "The United Nations Security Council spends more in coffee than in tanks, battleships and bombers combined"

The WHO isn't a direct aid organization.

It's a political organization it defines policies and helps to execute and oversee them.

If say a country needs vaccines the WHO can help them secure funding usually through the world bank or other financial institutions as well as potentially better prices by facilitating deals with the drug companies directly.

People think that the WHO is the red cross or Doctors Without Borders or the UNHCR.

But in its mandate and in practice it's more closer to the IAEA and other similar UN organizations.

Re: World Health Organization spends more on travel than AIDS

#24

Post by Xoros » Thu, May 25, 2017, 7:03 PM UTC

I had the chance to briefly meet (22 years ago) an Harvard Teacher who was also involved in AIDS research with UN.

He was going to go to Nepal to meet local doctors and authorities.

He had to "fight" to get a normal airplane ticket instead of the first class his organization was ready to pay him.

Because the first class ticket was more expensive than the Nepal AIDS fighting year budget...