. /.  WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  G/SPS/GEN/522 
21 October 2004 
 (04-4471) 
Committee on Sanitary a nd Phytosanitary Measures Original:   English 
  
 
INTERNATIONAL HEALTH REGULATIONS REVISION 
 
Communication from the World Health Organization (WHO
) 
  
 The following communication, dated 19 October 2004, is being circulated at the request of 
the World Health Organization.  
_______________ 
  
1. The International Health Regulations (IHR) revision project is pleased to report that at the 
beginning of this month all 192 WHO Member Stat es received the draft revision for review of the 
proposed amendments to the IHR.  This draft is the culmination of the extensive consultation and 
testing of concepts that has taken place with a ll major stakeholders since WHO last updated the SPS 
Committee in March 2000.  Technical and expert meeti ngs were held with inte rnational shippers and 
ship owners, aircraft operators, and our international counterparts such as ICAO, IMO, ISF, and the 
WTO Secretariat.  In January 2004 a preliminar y draft working paper of the proposed Regulations 
was sent to all Member States and other major stakeholders for their further comments.  A series of regional and subregional consultati ons were held from March to July 2004 in which the Member 
States provided direct input into the working paper.  These comments and reports from Regional 
committees meetings are available on the IHR website:  
http://www.who.int/csr/ihr/revisionprocess/comments/en/
   
2. The next step in the revision process is to submit the draft revision for review and approval of 
the proposed amendments to an Intergovernmental Wo rking Group that will convene at the Palais des 
Nations, Geneva, 1-12 November 2004.  The list of documents for the meeting is available at the 
following website: http://www.who.int/gb/ghs/e/index.html   
3. The March 2000 report of the International Health Regulations Revision to the SPS 
Committee stated that the potential for conflict between the IHR and the SPS Agreement (and other 
international legal regimes) would undoubtedly grow in future as the current Regulations were being 
rewritten, to, amongst other things, provide a c onsiderably expanded scope for preventing the 
international spread of a wide range of diseases1.  The key areas of potential overlap with WTO 
agreements were related to international disease even ts and/or contaminated food which could disrupt 
the distribution of food products and the potential for an IHR dispute ruling that could interfere with 
subsequent WTO actions.  The concern about minimizing possible conflicts and maximizing 
synergies with the SPS and other international inst ruments was raised by several Member States in 
their submitted comments and at the regional meetings.  
4. To this end, the WHO commissioned a team of respected international lawyers to review the 
January 2004 working paper in light of other inte rnational legal instruments and received a number of 
comments and contributions on this topic.  A summary  of relevant c onclusions is available on the IHR 
                                                      
1 Beyond cholera, plague and yellow fever. G/SPS/GEN/522 
Page 2  
 
 IGWG website:  http://www.who.int/gb/ghs/pdf/A_IHR_IGWG_ID1-en.pdf
.  Generally speaking, it 
was felt that WTO agreements and the proposed revisions are compatible and offer broad areas of synergy.  The relevant WTO agreements in fact recognize in various ways the right of Members to protect health from trade-related risks through th e application of certain disciplines, which may 
accommodate obligations or recommendations based on the International Health Regulations that 
affect international trade in certain goods and services.  
5. The review also identified two possible areas of overlap.  First, the IHR prohibition on 
requiring health documents other than, "routine doc ument requirements concerning the public health 
status of goods or cargo in international trad e [issued] pursuant to ap plicable international 
agreements". WTO agreements, on the other hand , would arguably allow the Parties to those 
agreements to impose "non-routine" document requi rements concerning the public health status of 
goods and cargo.  In order to eliminate this possibl e conflict, the word "routine" does not appear in 
Article 31 of the latest draft revision. 
6. The second possible overlap concerns the issu ance by WHO of temporary or standing 
recommendations.  Despite their non-binding nature, such recommendations give States Parties the 
authority to implement them, a right that might conflict with obligations under the relevant WTO 
agreements.  Even though actual conflicts could be  considered unlikely in view of the disciplines 
contained in the WTO agreements, attempts have been made to facilitate the compatibility between 
recommendations based on the International Health Regulations and trade-related obligations through 
the establishment of criteria similar to those used un der the WTO agreements  to justify measures that 
restrict trade. 
7. In closing, the IHR revision projects is happy to continue working with the SPS Committee to 
keep it apprised of health developments regarding outbreaks that can impact on international trade.  
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. 
 
 
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