Monaco at the 77th World Health Assembly

The Principality participated in the 77th World Health Assembly (WHA), the supreme decision-making body of the World Health Organization (WHO), held in Geneva from May 27 to June 1, 2024. For the first time, Monaco was elected to be part of the Assembly’s Bureau, whose role is to coordinate the session’s work.

This year’s general debate theme was “A World Mobilized for Health, Health for All”. In her speech, H.E. Ms. Carole LANTERI, Ambassador, Permanent Representative of the Principality to the United Nations Office at Geneva, and Head of Delegation, notably recalled the excellence of the public health policy resulting in the fact that in the Principality “Health for all is not an ideal, but a reality”.

Due to the international context, the session was marked by lengthy debates on the agenda items concerning the health situations in Ukraine and the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan.

From a normative standpoint, the aim was to continue and conclude the work initiated in 2022 by the working group on amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005; WGIHR) and those of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body tasked with negotiating an international pandemic instrument (INB). The WGIHR successfully fulfilled its mission of submitting a set of amendments to the IHR (2005) to this 77th Assembly. As for the INB, the Assembly chose to extend the INB’s work for one year, as these negotiations could not be completed.

Finally, the Principality co-sponsored several resolutions on priority themes for Monaco such as: climate change and health; emergency preparedness; mental health in conflict and natural disaster situations; reduction of maternal, newborn, and child mortality; or improvement of health and well-being in the context of sporting events.