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World Health Organization and United Nations Documents on the Ebola Outbreak in West Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Gian Luca Burci  and
Jakob Quirin
Gian Luca Burci
Affiliation:
Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva
Jakob Quirin
Affiliation:
WHO Office of the Legal Counsel
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Extract

The United Nations (UN) Security Council, for the first time in its history, declared a disease outbreak as “a threat to international peace and security” on September 18, 2014. An outbreak of Ebola in West Africa, the most harmful outbreak of this disease ever recorded, gave it cause to do so. The Ebola outbreak also marked the first time that the UN Secretary-General deployed, under his authority, a “United Nations emergency health mission”—neither a peacekeeping operation, nor a “political mission.” Finally, the Ebola outbreak motivated the World Health Organization (WHO) to make use of its authority to declare a “public health emergency of international concern” under the International Health Regulations (IHR) for the third time since their entry into force and induced the WHO Director-General to convene, for the third time in WHO’s history, a special session of the WHO Executive Board to reform WHO’s role in disease outbreak response. The materials presented below form essential background to these important developments in international health law and in the institutional practice of the United Nations system.

Type
International Legal Materials
Information
International Legal Materials , Volume 54 , Issue 3 , June 2015 , pp. 532 - 560
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 2015

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References

* This text was reproduced and reformatted from the text available at the World Health Organization website (visited May 12, 2015), http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/statements/2014/ebola-20140808/en/.

1 World Health Organization [WHO], International Health Regulations (2d ed. 2005)Google Scholar, available at http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2008/9789241580410_eng.pdf[hereinafterIHR].WHOConst.art.21,availableat http://www.who.int/governance/eb/who_constitution_en.pdf.

2 Article 1 IHR defines a public health emergency of international concern as an “extraordinary event which is determined, as provided in these Regulations: (i) to constitute a public health risk to other States through the international spread of disease and (ii) to potentially require a coordinated international response.” WHO Const. art. 1.

3 Article 1 IHR defines temporary recommendations as “nonbinding advice issued by WHO pursuant to Article 15 for application on a time-limited, risk-specific basis, in response to a public health emergency of international concern, so as to prevent or reduce the international spread of disease and minimize interference with international traffic.” Id. art. 1.

4 See id. art. 43.

5 See Press Release, Security Council, Security Council Press Statement on United Nations Office for West Africa, U.N. Press Release SC/11466-AFR/2930 (July 9, 2014), available at www.un.org/press/en/2014/sc11466.doc.htm; U.N. SCOR, 69th Sess., 7260th mtg., U.N. Doc. S/PV.7260 (Sept. 9, 2014); Press Release, Security Council, Adopting Resolution 2176 (2014), Security Council Approves Three-Month Extension for United Nations Mission in Liberia, with Further Renewal under Review, U.N. Press Release SC/11559 (Sept. 14, 2014), available at www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2014/sc11559.doc.htm.

6 U.N. Secretary General, Statement by the Secretary-General on the establishment of the United Nations Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) (Sept. 19, 2014)Google Scholar, available at http://www.un.org/sg/statements/index.asp?nid=8006.

7 S.C. Res. 2177, U.N. Doc. S/RES/2177 (Sept. 18, 2014), available at http://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/RES/2177%20(2014).

8 Previous milestones in this discourse were the open debate held by the Council in January 2000 on “The Situation in Africa: The Impact of AIDS on International Peace and Security,” following which the Council linked the mandates and training of peacekeeping operations to the prevention of the spread of HIV/AIDS. See S.C. Res. 1308, U.N. Doc. S/RES/1308 (July 17, 2000). For the meeting record see U.N. SCOR, 55th Sess., 4087th mtg., U.N. Doc. S/PV.4087 (Jan. 10, 2000), as well as the 2005 report “In Larger Freedom” by the U.N. Secretary-General, in which he said to be “ready, in consultation with the Director-General of [WHO], to use my powers under Article 99 of the Charter of the United Nations to call to the attention of the Security Council any overwhelming outbreak of infectious disease that threatens international peace and security.” U.N. Secretary-General, In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All, ¶ 105, U.N. Doc. A/59/2005 (Mar. 21, 2005), available at www.un.org/en/events/pastevents/in_larger_freedom.shtml. The 2005 World Summit Outcome was more cautious, yet still called for a full implementation of the revised IHR (2005). See G.A. Res. 60/1, ¶ 57(e), U.N. Doc. A/Res/60/1 (Oct. 24, 2005), available at http://www.un.org/womenwatch/ods/A-RES-60-1-E.pdf). At the 2011 Security Council meeting on new challenges to international peace and security and conflict prevention, the Secretary-General mentioned “pandemics” as one of the three defining challenges of our time. U.N. SCOR, 66th Sess., 6668th mtg., at 2, U.N. Doc. S/PV.6668 (Nov. 23, 2011). But see the statement by WHO Director-General, Margaret Chan, id. at 7.

9 See UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), United Nations Global Ebola Response, http://ebolaresponse.un.org/un-mission-ebola-emergencyresponse-unmeer (last visited March 19, 2015)Google Scholar; Press Release, WHO Welcomes Decision to Establish United Nations Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (Sept. 19, 2014)Google Scholar, available at www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2014/ebola-emergency-response/en/.

10 U.N. Secretary-General, Identical Letters Dated 17 September 2014 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the General Assembly and the President of the Security Council, at 2, U.N. Doc. A/69/389 –S/2014/679 (Sept. 18, 2014), available at undocs.org.

11 G.A. Res. 69/1, U.N. Doc. A/RES/69/1 (Sept. 19, 2014). UNGA resolution 69/3 on the United Nations Mission for Ebola Emergency Response and UNGA resolution 69/132 on Global Health and Foreign Policy are further relevant Assembly resolutions passed in the wake of the Ebola outbreak but focus more on the administrative/budgetary side of UNMEER and the safety and protection of medical and health personnel, respectively.

12 U.N. Secretary-General, Letter Dated 12 March 2015 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the General Assembly, ¶ 71, U.N. Doc. A/69/812 (March 13, 2015); U.N. Secretary-General, Letter Dated 10 February 2015 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the General Assembly, ¶ 77, U.N. Doc. A/69/759 (Feb. 10, 2015); U.N. Secretary-General, Letter Dated 12 January 2015 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the General Assembly, at 9, U.N. Doc. A/69/720 (Jan. 13, 2015); U.N. Secretary-General, Letter Dated 12 November 2014 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the General Assembly, at 1, U.N. Doc. A/69/573 (Nov. 12, 2014).

13 WHO, Executive Board, Res. EBSS3.R1 (Jan. 25, 2015).

14 Cf. WHO Const., art. 58 (“A special fund to be used at the discretion of the Board shall be established to meet emergencies and unforeseen contingencies.”).

15 World Health Assembly Decision WHA68(10), Contingency Fund ¶ 2–4.

16 See IHR, supra note 1, arts. 50–53.

17 WHO Const., pmbl. (“The health of all peoples is fundamental to the attainment of peace and security . . . .”).

18 David, P. Fidler & Lawrence, O. Gostin, Biosecurity in the Global Age 145 (2008)Google Scholar; see also Gian, Luca Burci, Health and Infectious Diseases , in The Oxford Handbook of the United Nations 582 (Thomas, G. Weiss & Sam, Daws eds., 2007)Google Scholar.

1 See A/69/389-S/2014/679.