• WHO Member States have re-elected Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to serve a second five-year term as director-general of the world’s leading public health agency. 

• Tedros was first elected in 2017.

• His re-election was confirmed during the 75th World Health Assembly in Geneva. He was the sole candidate.

• Tedros received 155 out of 160 votes cast, although he did not win the support of his native Ethiopia, due to opposing views over the Tigray conflict.

World Health Assembly

• The World Health Assembly is the decision-making body of WHO. It is attended by delegations from all WHO Member States and focuses on a specific health agenda prepared by the Executive Board. 

The main functions of the World Health Assembly are:

i) To determine the policies of the organisation.

ii) Appoint the director-general.

iii) Supervise financial policies.

iv) Review and approve the proposed programme budget. 

• The Health Assembly is held annually in Geneva, Switzerland.

Election process

• The director-general is WHO’s chief technical and administrative officer.

• The election process began in April 2021 when Member States were invited to submit proposals for candidates for the post of Director-General. The deadline to submit proposals closed on September 23, 2021.

• Information on proposals as received from Member States was published on October 29, 2021.

• Tedros was proposed as a candidate by several Member States, and was the only candidate proposed. 

• The Executive Board at its 150th session in January 2022 nominated Tedros for the post of director-general of WHO. 

• The nomination was considered by the 75th World Health Assembly in May 2022 and he was appointed as the director-general by secret ballot.   

• A director-general can be re-appointed once.

Who is Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus?

• Tedros is the first African to lead the agency and the only director-general not qualified as a medical doctor.

• Before first being appointed WHO director-general, Tedros served as Ethiopia’s minister of foreign affairs from 2012–2016 and as minister of health from 2005–2012. He had also served as chair of the Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, as chair of the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership Board, and as co-chair of the Board of the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health.

• Tedros’s new mandate officially commences on August 16, 2022. 

• During his first term, Tedros guided WHO’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, outbreaks of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the health impacts of multiple other humanitarian crises.

World Health Organisation

• The WHO is an agency of the United Nations set up in 1948 to improve health globally. It has more than 8,000 people working in 150 country offices, six regional offices and its Geneva headquarters.

• The WHO has 194 Member States.

• Its director general is elected for a five-year term. 

• The WHO’s stated aim is “to promote health, keep the world safe and serve the vulnerable”.

• It has no power to impose health policies on national governments, but acts as an adviser and offers guidance on best practice in disease prevention and health improvement.

It has three main strands of work: 

i) Aiming for universal health coverage in every country.

ii) Preventing and responding to acute emergencies.

iii) Promoting health and well-being for all.

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