IN-DEPTH: Former Congresswoman Calls for Immediate Exit From the WHO

Small figurines are seen in front of the World Health Organization logo in this illustration taken on Feb. 11, 2022. (Dado Ruvic/Reuters)

A former Minnesota congresswoman is calling for an immediate exit from the World Health Organization (WHO) as it inches closer to establishing governance over nations during a declared public health emergency.

“This is very serious, and it’s approaching faster than anyone realized,” Michele Bachmann told The Epoch Times.

Bachmann, now dean of the Robertson School of Government at Regent University in Virginia Beach, Virginia, was a U.S. representative for Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District from 2007 to 2015, as well as a candidate for the 2012 presidential election.

In May, Bachmann attended the WHO’s 76th World Health Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland, where national leaders discussed the draft of a pandemic treaty and 307 proposed amendments to the 2005 International Health Regulations.

The regulations, first adopted in 1969 and updated in 2005, are described by the WHO as an “overarching legal framework” of international law to which 196 countries are legally bound to regulate the “rights and obligations in handling public health events and emergencies that have the potential to cross borders.”

The assembly made no deciding vote on the amendments or bureau text (pdf), Bachmann said.

Michele Bachmann, 2023. (Courtesy of Michele Bachmann)

What’s unusual, she added, is that it didn’t discuss the WHO’s announcement on June 5 that it would be adopting the European Union’s (EU) digital COVID-19 vaccine passport system, leaving Bachmann to question the WHO’s authority to make final decisions without a discussion or vote.

“Nothing was mentioned at the assembly in Geneva, so that’s extremely strange,” Bachmann said.

The vaccine passport system will not only be used for surveillance, tracking, and tracing of travel but also for the monitoring of an individual’s compliance with decisions and mandates made by the WHO, Bachmann said.

“But that is just the building block,” she said. “They made it clear that they are planning on adding to this digital compliance.”

There are components of the bureau text itself that would create what Bachmann called a “medical dictatorship.”

“The powers that are envisioned will cover areas such as the environment, racism, poverty, and climate change,” she said. “The powers are so broad, and they’re written in such a bureaucratized way, that they essentially arrogate to them unlimited power over all its member states.”

‘Absolutely Dystopian’

Independent journalist and researcher James Roguski called the report “absolutely dystopian in its scope and in its cleverness.”

“The proposed treaty could be provisionally adopted by each of the nations who would become party to the document,” Roguski said in a video statement on the bureau text. “The Conference of the Party (CP) would set up an absolutely independent bureaucracy that would be beyond parliamentary or congressional control. This transfer of power from ‘We the People’ to unelected, unaccountable, and largely unknown and invisible members of the so-called Conference of the Parties is a very well disguised but direct attack on the sovereignty of nations.”

According to the document, the conference of the party would commit to “strengthen multisectoral, coordinated, interoperable and integrated One Health surveillance systems and strengthen laboratory capacity to identify and assess the risks and emergence of pathogens and variants with pandemic potential, in order to minimize spill-over events, mutations and the risks associated with zoonotic neglected tropical vector-borne diseases, with a view to preventing small-scale outbreaks in wildlife or domesticated animals from becoming a pandemic.”

One Health Surveillance and Censorship

The WHO’s One Health ideology is defined as an “integrated, unifying approach that aims to sustainably balance and optimize the health of people, animals and ecosystems.”

“It recognizes the health of humans, domestic and wild animals, plants, and the wider environment (including ecosystems) are closely linked and inter-dependent,” the document states.

The word “surveillance” is found 11 times in the document in relation to One Health, such as under Article 4 on page 7 where it states, “The Parties shall take prevention and surveillance measures that are consistent with and supportive of effective implantation of the International Health Regulations.”

The conference of the party would also be tasked with combating what it calls “infodemic,” defined as “false or misleading information in digital physical environments during a disease outbreak.”

“It causes confusion and risk-taking behaviors that can harm health,” the document states. “It also leads to mistrust in health authorities and undermines the public health response.”

‘A New Level of Unrestricted Power’

According to Bachmann, the unelected conference of the party would supersede the authority of the 194 member states and be empowered to revise and change the rules under which it operates without bringing those changes to a vote.

“This is a new level of unrestricted power over individuals,” Bachmann said. “The shocking thing is that there was no disagreement registered in any of the public forums.”

Instead, what Bachmann said she witnessed was akin to the 1972 satirical feminist horror movie, “The Stepford Wives.”

“It was just smiling, happy compliance,” Bachmann said. “No one is allowed to disagree, and that’s what the new proposed amendments and treaty envisions: no disagreement, just enforcement and happy compliance with whatever this unelected, international body tells the rest of us what we have to do.”

Bachmann reported the deleting of words such as “human dignity and freedom,” and other personal protections out of the proposed amendments to the International Health Regulations to adjust behaviors to the new power structure.

On page 3 under “Article 3 Principles,” the line “with full respect of the dignity, human rights and fundamental freedoms of persons” is struck out and replaced with the new proposed text, “based on the principles of equity, inclusivity, coherence and in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities of the States Parties, taking into consideration their social and economic development.”

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization (C), celebrates his reelection during the 75th World Health Assembly at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva on May 24, 2022. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

Climate Change and the ‘Next Pandemic’

Climate change was frequently touted as the primary problem in health care, she said.

Given the tenets of One Health and the criteria for health care policies, Bachmann concluded that humans would no longer be a priority, instead being subordinate to the climate.

“If the goal is to ensure that the temperature on Earth doesn’t rise above—let’s say 1.5 degrees 100 years from now—decisions will be made to achieve that goal, rather than the goal of humans,” Bachmann said.

Significantly lacking during the assembly was a review of how the WHO handled the last pandemic, with frequent discussions on “the next pandemic.”

“There was no review that we heard,” Bachmann said. “The only review that we heard was that the problem was power and money, and so presumably what that meant is that the WHO needed to have more control, power, and money in order to be able to dictate decision making.”

There was no discussion on the source of the pandemic, no call for accountability to the Chinese Communist Party, and no discussion on adverse reactions to the vaccines.

“The only focus was on increasing the scope and power of the World Health Organization over public health emergencies of international concern,” Bachmann said.

The timetable to make the treaty and proposed amendments to international law was set for the 77th World Health Assembly conference in 2024, Bachmann said.

“That will complete the transfer of individual nation-state sovereignty over health care decisions to the World Health Organization,” Bachmann said. “The WHO can then invoke public health emergencies of international concern, not only in the case of a pandemic, but if there is also a potential health care emergency, and the criteria for that includes racism, income inequality, and climate change.”

‘Endless Emergency Powers’

Bachmann added that she saw no language in the proposed amendments or bureau text that would limit the WHO’s emergency powers or how long those powers could last.

“It would be just like we saw in the United States with endless emergency powers extended month after month,” she said.

In April, President Joe Biden signed a bipartisan congressional resolution to end the emergency declaration three years after it was put in place.

However, with smoke from the Canadian wildfires descending on the eastern United States, many Democrats are calling for Biden to declare another national health emergency, this time not around the pandemic but the climate.

The WHO’s Director, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, chimed in on Twitter, stating, “The #ClimateCrisis knows no borders. The wildfire smoke spreading from Canada to the US demonstrates, yet again, the immediate danger exposure to air pollution poses to our health. We know the solutions. How many lives lost will it take to act?”

A boat navigates the Hudson River as the New York City skyline is covered with haze and smoke from Canada wildfires in Weehawken, N.J. on June 7, 2023. (Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images)

‘This Cannot Be Allowed’

Bachmann’s concern now, she said, is her sense that members from the House of Representatives and the Senate aren’t aware of the severity of the threat to America’s civil liberties.

“For that reason, I’m calling on members of the House and Senate to push this issue to the front burner and examine what’s happening with the World Health Organization,” she said. “Some members are saying that because this is a treaty, they aren’t worried because it will have to be voted on in the Senate, and even the Democrats wouldn’t vote in favor. And if it somehow passed, the U.S. court system would strike it down.”

Bachmann, however, said she believes this is naïve.

“It’s thinking by people who still run their lives by the Constitution and rule of law,” she said. “But the people who are making this new system aren’t observing U.S. law. They are not concerned with protecting the rights of American citizens under the Bill of Rights.”

What Congress must do now, Bachmann said, is take the necessary steps to exit the WHO immediately.

“They should be holding hearings day and night and not stop until we get the United States out,” she said.

Bachmann called it a “treasonous action” to yield authority to an unelected, international entity that makes laws outside of the parameters of the Constitution.

“This cannot be allowed,” Bachmann said. “People don’t understand that this will impact every aspect of our lives.”

Though in writing the goals of the WHO to strive for clean air and water, and to be wise stewards of the earth’s resources to create a balance between man and nature sound reasonable, in truth, Bachmann said, this is a cover story hiding another agenda.

“This is about a very strange level of control that we’ve never seen before,” Bachmann said. “It envisions dominance over every nation and person on this Earth.”

The Epoch Times contacted the WHO for comment.