ICT Hot Topics for April 17, 2025: WHO Member States, Measles, H5N1, and More

Hot Topics with Saskia v. Popescu, PhD, MPH, MA, CIC

Member States Reach Consensus on Pandemic Treaty

Many years of negotiations and hard work have brought us to an important moment for the pandemic agreement. This week, World Health Organization (WHO) Member States concluded meetings with a draft agreement that will then go to the World Health Assembly in May 2025.

Per the WHO, “In December 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, WHO Member States established the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) to draft and negotiate a convention, agreement or other international instrument, under the WHO Constitution, to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness and response. Following 13 formal rounds of meetings, [9] of which were extended, and many informal and intersessional negotiations on various aspects of the draft agreement, the INB today finalized a proposal for the WHO Pandemic Agreement. The outcome of the INB’s work will now be presented to the Seventy-eighth World Health Assembly for its consideration.”

The agreement includes critical measures to prevent and respond to pandemics, such as One Health, ensuring geographical diversity in research and development capacities, technology and knowledge transfer, an emergency workforce, etc. “The proposal affirms the sovereignty of countries to address public health matters within their borders, and provides that nothing in the draft agreement shall be interpreted as providing WHO any authority to direct, order, alter or prescribe national laws or policies, or mandate States to take specific actions, such as ban or accept [travelers], impose vaccination mandates or therapeutic or diagnostic measures or implement lockdowns.”

US Outbreak Updates: From Measles to H5N1

The USDA has reported 11 new infected herds across Idaho, California, and Arizona. Since the outbreak began a year ago, the US has seen a cumulative national tally of 1,020 infected herds, with California impacted the most (763 total). What is particularly worrisome is that Idaho has reported 8 newly infected herds, which indicates rapid spread and/or gaps in surveillance.

There are now 712 measles cases across the US, with 660 (93%) outbreak-associated, and 97% of all cases in individuals who are unvaccinated or have an unknown vaccination status. A total of 38% of cases occur in individuals aged 5 to 19 years, and 11% of all cases (79 in total) have required hospitalization.

US Health Agencies

As thousands of federal workers grapple with the recent mass layoffs across health agencies, the internal coordination and management of important work becomes strained and, for many, chaotic.

As David Gilbert noted, there are significant impacts on the cybersecurity of various agencies and efforts within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). “As a result of a reduction in force, or RIF, in the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO), the sources say, staff who oversee and renew contracts for critical enterprise services are no longer there. The same staff oversaw hundreds of contractors, some of whom play a crucial role in keeping systems and data safe from cyberattacks. And a void of leadership means that efforts to draw attention to what the sources believe to be a looming catastrophe have allegedly been ignored.”

As offices and divisions work to recalibrate with the post-reduction-in-force realities, it is likely we’ll continue to see similar reports. Many are tracking the impact, such as the dashboard within Brown University’s School of Public Health from Brooke Nichols, PhD, MSc, which monitors anticipated deaths from the US Agency for International Development funding cuts.