WHO Lays Off More Than 2 Thousand Employees, Impact Of The United States Withdraws Membership

JAKARTA - The World Health Organization (WHO) must reduce large numbers of employees. This reduction was carried out as an effort to implement massive reforms, after the United States as the main donor of funding revoked its membership.

Quoted from Reuters, on Thursday, November 20, 2025, the WHO in Geneva projects that its workforce will shrink by 2,371 positions in June 2026. This reduced the number of 9,401 positions in January 2025.

WHO confirmed the total number of staff leaving the organization. Workers will be reduced by up to 22 percent, which in addition to pruning, reductions are also made from staff retiring or resignations.

WHO Director-General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that this year was indeed the most difficult year for WHO. Various things that WHO had to do were challenged and hampered after the US lifted its membership.

However, despite the difficulties, Tedros said that this moment was needed for organizational updates to be better in the future.

"We are now preparing to move forward with our organization that has been formed and updated," Tedros said.