The world has to be ready for the next health crisis, Secretary Blinken said.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra announced the establishment of the Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy as part of the State Department. The new agency will elevate issues of global health as part of America’s international policies.
The officials stated, “Health transcends borders, economies, security. Ways of life rise and fall based on health,” and added that the American way of life is “tied intrinsically to that of everyone else,” and that the resources in medicine and technology “belong to them just as much as they belong to us.”
Secretary Blinken said the bureau’s new structure would “allow health security experts and diplomats to work more effectively together to prevent, detect, and respond to existing and future health threats. We have to be ready, and the world at large has to be ready. That is the central mission of the new bureau.”
Secretary Blinken announced that Dr. John Nkengasong would serve as the director of the new bureau. He is presently the U.S. global AIDS coordinator and special representative for health diplomacy.
“A pandemic is not only a health crisis, it’s a security crisis, it’s an economic crisis, it’s a humanitarian crisis,” Secretary Blinken said. “That includes by working with partners to modernize existing organizations like the World Health Organization (WHO) so that they’re more fit for purpose and by shaping new structures like the Pandemic Fund.”
As the Lord Leads, Pray with Us…
- For Secretary Blinken to be led by the Lord as he heads the State Department.
- For Dr. Nkengasong as he fills his new role as director of the Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy.
Sources: Washington Examiner, New York Times, Health Watch
