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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:18AM   Printer-friendly
from the who? dept.

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

The UN's World Health Organization ponies up some $200 million a year for luxury travel, including first-class tickets and posh hotels – much more than it spends on combatting[sic] AIDS, tuberculosis, or malaria, the AP has revealed.

According to internal files obtained by the news agency, since 2013, the World Health Organization (WHO) has allocated $803 million for travel – approximately $200 million per year. The WHO's two-billion-dollar annual budget is made up of contributions made by 194 member countries, of which the US is the largest sponsor.

Last year, the WHO allocated just over $60 million to tackling malaria and $59 million to containing the spread of tuberculosis, while $71 million was spent on fighting AIDS and hepatitis. Programs aimed at containing certain diseases, such as polio, do get considerably larger funding, however, with $450 million allocated annually.

Though the organization has been struggling to achieve its goals, while at the same time appealing for more financing, its employees and top brass apparently do not shy away from booking first-class airline tickets and rooms in luxurious five-star hotels.

In particular, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan and Executive Director Bruce Aylward are first and second on the list of the agency's top spenders, according to a confidential 25-page analysis of the WHO's expenses seen by AP.

Source: https://www.rt.com/news/389198-who-travel-costs-report/

Additional Coverage: U.S. News & World Report


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:38AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:38AM (#514672)

    "Combatting" is correct.

  • (Score: 3, Funny) by archfeld on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:43AM

    by archfeld (4650) <treboreel@live.com> on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:43AM (#514673) Journal

    WHO is on first, FEMA is on second, and Congress consistently misses the entire game/flight.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTcRRaXV-fg [youtube.com]

    --
    For the NSA : Explosives, guns, assassination, conspiracy, primers, detonators, initiators, main charge, nuclear charge
  • (Score: 2) by cafebabe on Wednesday May 24 2017, @05:25AM

    by cafebabe (894) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @05:25AM (#514683) Journal

    Although the WHO's office in Rome closed at the end of 2011 [who.int], I heard that the restaurant on the top floor overlooked Rome's Colosseum and served amazing five course meals. Also, from the daughter of a WHO administrator in Zambia, the WHO paid first world salaries to third world workers - and they lived like kings.

    --
    1702845791×2
  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @05:34AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @05:34AM (#514685)

    How do you disperse and dispense treatment and verify service if you don't travel?

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by lx on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:00AM (1 child)

      by lx (1915) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:00AM (#514689)

      Travel is necessary, business class travel and five star hotels is just being greedy.

      • (Score: 2) by rondon on Wednesday May 24 2017, @12:32PM

        by rondon (5167) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @12:32PM (#514767)

        Business class is fine for long flights, and doesn't generally add up to ridiculous price tags. Its the 5 star hotels, meals, and actual first class flights that chew up a budget in no time.

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by bradley13 on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:11AM (5 children)

    by bradley13 (3053) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:11AM (#514691) Homepage Journal

    WHO is a governmental organization, and specifically not a charity. I don't really have a problem with the executives flying something above cattle-class and staying in reasonably nice hotels. That said, booking $1000/night suites is definitely over the top.

    To be fair, however, this information comes from internal documents. These documents are from WHO's internal efforts to document and correct the problem. They document, for example, that 'compliance with rules that travel be booked in advance was "very low"'. The question will be if they are serious about correcting this, i.e., enforcing the rules. That is surprisingly easy: I once had a government job that required a lot of travel - if I booked something against the rules, it simply wouldn't be reimbursed, i.e., it would come out of my own pocket. Let the staff pay for their own hotel suites a few times, and rules compliance will go up really fast.

    Finally, how does it look for big NGOs like the Red Cross? I'm expecting that they are no better, in fact, probably worse. Remember when the Red Cross misplaced $500 million in relief funds for Haiti? [npr.org]

    Money generally gets soaked up by ever-expanding administration and bureaucracy. Pournelle's Iron Law. This is one of the primary arguments for keeping government and governmental organizations as small as possible. Even better would be to elimiate and replace them on a regular basis.

    --
    Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
    • (Score: 2) by arslan on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:30AM (1 child)

      by arslan (3462) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:30AM (#514694)

      or apply the same standards for those administrative/executive folks as the regular joe sixpack. That means cattle class everything and a limit on how much they travel per year.

      Afterall if the ones paying for them, i.e. regular joe sixpack with their tax dollars, don't get business/first class and 5 stars and multiple junkets a year why should they?

      Only very specific top brass in the certain government branches should have special privileges.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by zocalo on Wednesday May 24 2017, @09:24AM

        by zocalo (302) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @09:24AM (#514735)
        I'd agree, and especially on the abuse of policy, but I think it needs some discretion based on the indivudual and the specifics of the trip rather than a blanket cut-off for the top-brass only. I often fly business class and will typically get a good deal of work done on long haul flights as I don't sleep well on aircraft, and as watching a movie on a crappy screen is seldom worth the effort..., but it's not at all uncommon to see plenty of others doing the same. Trying to be a productive in the limited room of cattle class - or even "premium econony" - is usually a non-starter, barring being blessed with an adjacent unoccupied seat. If you're expecting your staffer to arrive on-site having done some prep work - or even just rested and ready to start work shortly after landing - then you are going to have to provide them with the necessary space and comfort to do that.

        The hotel suites is a different matter but, again, not unrealistic in the right circumstances - it's all down to the trip, who you are meeting, and why. Senior officials are often going to be meeting with other senior officials and national leaders that both expect and require a certain level of comfort and security; a low-end chain simply isn't going to cut it. You're also limited to facilities with suitable conference facilities, which again typical rules out most lower-end chains, especially if you are planning on meetings that are to go on into the evening, so it's highly convenient to have everyone in one place rather than scattered across several hotels in a city - all of which can push the bar quite a way upwards.

        The specific use of suites is trickier, but again, for private meetings or prep work away from the main conference (which is where the real work often gets done) they can be absolutely essential, so it's really a matter of discretion due to the nature and purpose of the booking. If you need the extra workspace for whatever reason, or might need ad-hoc breakout meetings, then a suite - with the option of both formal table based and informal sofa based discussions - is a good way to go, and can actually work out cheaper overall than a couple of separate bedrooms and an extra meeting room or two.
        --
        UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @10:22AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @10:22AM (#514743)

      WHO is a governmental organization

      Exactly. And more importantly, their role is to provide a platform for COORDINATION of efforts. There is plenty of resources elsewhere that are used to get actual work done.

      It would be like saying, "Debian spends tons of money on subsidizing conference travel costs, not on its distribution". Which would be true and massively misleading.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:36PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:36PM (#514916)

        Which would be true and massively misleading.

        And that pretty much sums up every single non-technical story submission from the mighty bumblefuck.
        The guy even goes to great lengths to advertise just how out of touch he is by constantly submitting stories from RT.
        When will the editors wise up?
        Apparently never.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:32PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @04:32PM (#514913)

      Money generally gets soaked up by ever-expanding administration and bureaucracy. Pournelle's Iron Law. This is one of the primary arguments for keeping government and governmental organizations as small as possible. Even better would be to elimiate and replace them on a regular basis.

      That's not a cure, that's recipe for infection. The solution for bloated, ineffective government is not deconstruction. It is good governance. Good governance takes care, expertise and lots of hard work. Tearing down is easy and simple, but there are no shortcuts in life. When you tear down institutions and then fail to put in the hard work you failed to put in with the prior institution the people that fill the void will be at best inexperienced and more likely craven opportunists and then we are worse off than before.

      "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong"

      PS, anyone who ever read Pournelle's Chaos Manor column in Byte knows the guy is a self-important fool.

  • (Score: 2) by butthurt on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:32AM (1 child)

    by butthurt (6141) on Wednesday May 24 2017, @06:32AM (#514696) Journal

    I tried to open the original article,

    https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-05-21/ap-exclusive-strapped-un-health-agency-spends-big-on-travel [usnews.com]

    When WebCite tried to archive the page, it received a Page Not Found error from the website concerned.

    https://www.webcitation.org/6qh0P1wuW [webcitation.org]

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @01:39PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @01:39PM (#514801)

      works for me
      brings up an article from the AP
      i block all javascript and cross-site references

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @02:35PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 24 2017, @02:35PM (#514821)

    Healthcare is simply overrrun by scandals like this. That is why they are trying to pass laws to force you to pay for their BS.

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