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Union Calendar No. 540 

118TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. R. 1425 

[Report No. 118–643] 

To require any convention, agreement, or other international instrument on 

pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response reached by the World 

Health Assembly to be subject to Senate ratification. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

MARCH 7, 2023 

Mr. TIFFANY (for himself, Mr. BIGGS, Ms. BOEBERT, Mr. FITZGERALD, Mr. 

GOODEN of Texas, Mr. GOSAR, Mrs. HARSHBARGER, Mrs. HOUCHIN, 

Mrs. MILLER of Illinois, Mr. NEHLS, Mr. ROY, Mr. SELF, Mr. SESSIONS, 

Mr. STEIL, and Ms. TENNEY) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs 

AUGUST 30, 2024 

Additional sponsors: Mr. GROTHMAN, Ms. HAGEMAN, Mr. STEUBE, Mr. HUDSON, Mr. MOOLENAAR, Mr. GUEST, Mr. OGLES, Mr. CRENSHAW, Mr. 

DUNCAN, Mr. ROSENDALE, Mr. NORMAN, Mr. WEBER of Texas, Mr. 

BRECHEEN, Mr. CLINE, Mr. BANKS, Mr. BABIN, Mr. CLOUD, Mr. 

GIMENEZ, Mr. SMITH of New Jersey, Mr. MEUSER, Mr. BACON, Mr. 

BEAN of Florida, Mr. GOOD of Virginia, Mr. DESJARLAIS, Mr. MOONEY, 

Mr. FINSTAD, Mr. MILLS, Mr. GREEN of Tennessee, Mr. STAUBER, Mr. 

FLEISCHMANN, Mr. LOUDERMILK, Mr. VAN DREW, Ms. MACE, Mr. 

MOORE of Alabama, Ms. STEFANIK, Mr. POSEY, Mr. MORAN, Ms. 

MALLIOTAKIS, Mr. ROSE, Mr. BERGMAN, Mr. DAVIDSON, Mr. JACKSON

of Texas, Mr. ZINKE, Mr. VAN ORDEN, and Mr. HILL

AUGUST 30, 2024 

Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union 

and ordered to be printed 


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A BILL 

To require any convention, agreement, or other international 

instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness, and 

response reached by the World Health Assembly to be 

subject to Senate ratification. 


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•HR 1425 RH

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘No WHO Pandemic 

5 Preparedness Treaty Without Senate Approval Act’’. 

6 SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 

7 Congress makes the following findings: 

8 (1) On May 18, 2020, President Donald Trump 

9 sent a letter to World Health Organization (referred 

10 to in this Act as ‘‘WHO’’) Director-General Tedros 

11 Adhanom Ghebreyesus (referred to in this Act as the 

12 ‘‘Director-General’’), announcing that— 

13 (A) United States contributions to WHO 

14 would be halted due its mismanagement of the 

15 COVID–19 outbreak and its lack of independ16 ence from the People’s Republic of China; and 

17 (B) the United States would withdraw 

18 from WHO if it did not commit to substantive 

19 improvements within 30 days. 

20 (2) President Trump’s May 18 letter cited nu21 merous instances of WHO mismanagement of the 

22 COVID–19 pandemic, including— 

23 (A) unjustified delays informing member 

24 states about a potentially serious disease out25 break in Wuhan, China; and 


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1 (B) repeated grossly inaccurate or mis2 leading claims about the transmissibility of the 

3 virus and about the Government of China’s 

4 handling of the outbreak. 

5 (3) On June 30, 2020, Secretary of State Mike 

6 Pompeo formally notified the United Nations of the 

7 United States decision to withdraw from WHO, 

8 which would have taken effect on July 6, 2021, 

9 under the terms of a joint resolution adopted by 

10 Congress on June 14, 1948 (Public Law 80–643; 62 

11 Stat. 441). 

12 (4) A Pew Research Center survey conducted in 

13 April and May 2020 indicated that 51 percent of 

14 Americans felt that WHO had done a poor or fair 

15 job in managing the COVID–19 pandemic. 

16 (5) On January 20, 2021, President Joseph 

17 Biden sent United Nations Director-General Anto ́nio 

18 Guterres a letter retracting the United States notice 

19 of withdrawal from WHO. 

20 (6) On December 1, 2021, at the second special 

21 session of the World Health Assembly (referred to in 

22 this Act as the ‘‘WHA’’) decided— 

23 (A) to establish an intergovernmental ne24 gotiating body (referred to in this section as the 

25 ‘‘INB’’) to draft and negotiate a WHO convenVerDate Sep 11 2014 21:11 Aug 30, 2024 Jkt 049200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\H1425.RH H1425

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1 tion (referred to in this section as the ‘‘Conven2 tion’’), agreement, or other international instru3 ment on pandemic prevention, preparedness, 

4 and response, with a view to adoption under Ar5 ticle 19 or any other provision of the WHO 

6 Constitution; and 

7 (B) that the INB shall submit a progress 

8 report to the Seventy-sixth WHA and a working 

9 draft of the convention for consideration by the 

10 Seventy-seventh WHA, which is scheduled to 

11 take place beginning on March 18, 2024. 

12 (7) On February 24, March 14 and 15, and 

13 June 6 through 8 and 15 through 17, 2022, the 

14 INB held its inaugural meeting at which the Direc15 tor-General proposed the following 5 themes to guide 

16 the INB’s work in drafting the Convention: 

17 (A) Building national, regional, and global 

18 capacities based on a whole-of-government and 

19 whole-of-society approach. 

20 (B) Establishing global access and benefit 

21 sharing for all pathogens, and determining a 

22 global policy for the equitable production and 

23 distribution of countermeasures. 

24 (C) Establishing robust systems and tools 

25 for pandemic preparedness and response. 


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1 (D) Establishing a long-term plan for sus2 tainable financing to ensure support for global 

3 health threat management and response sys4 tems. 

5 (E) Empowering WHO to fulfill its man6 date as the directing and coordinating authority 

7 on international health work, including for pan8 demic preparedness and response. 

9 (8) On July 18 through 22, 2022, the INB held 

10 its second meeting at which it agreed that the Con11 vention would be adopted under Article 19 of the 

12 WHO Constitution and legally binding on the par13 ties. 

14 (9) On December 5 through 7, 2022, the INB 

15 held its third meeting at which it accepted a concep16 tual zero draft of the Convention and agreed to pre17 pare a zero draft for consideration at the INB’s next 

18 meeting. 

19 (10) In early January 2023, an initial draft of 

20 the Convention was sent to WHO member states in 

21 advance of its formal introduction at the fourth 

22 meeting of the INB, which is scheduled for February 

23 27 through March 3, 2023. The draft includes broad 

24 and binding provisions, including rules governing 

25 parties’ access to pathogen genomic sequences and 


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1 how the products or benefits of such access are to 

2 be distributed. 

3 (11) Section 723.3 of title 11 of the Depart4 ment of State’s Foreign Affairs Manual states that 

5 when ‘‘determining whether any international agree6 ment should be brought into force as a treaty or as 

7 an international agreement other than a treaty, the 

8 utmost care is to be exercised to avoid any invasion 

9 or compromise of the constitutional powers of the 

10 President, the Senate, and the Congress as a whole’’ 

11 and includes the following criteria to be considered 

12 when determining whether an international agree13 ment should take the form of a treaty or an execu14 tive agreement: 

15 (A) ‘‘The extent to which the agreement 

16 involves commitments or risks affecting the na17 tion as a whole’’. 

18 (B) ‘‘Whether the agreement is intended to 

19 affect state laws’’. 

20 (C) ‘‘Whether the agreement can be given 

21 effect without the enactment of subsequent leg22 islation by the Congress’’. 

23 (D) ‘‘Past U.S. practice as to similar 

24 agreements’’. 


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1 (E) ‘‘The preference of the Congress as to 

2 a particular type of agreement’’. 

3 (F) ‘‘The degree of formality desired for 

4 an agreement’’. 

5 (G) ‘‘The proposed duration of the agree6 ment, the need for prompt conclusion of an 

7 agreement, and the desirability of concluding a 

8 routine or short-term agreement’’. 

9 (H) ‘‘The general international practice as 

10 to similar agreements’’. 

11 SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS. 

12 It is the sense of Congress that— 

13 (1) a significant segment of the American pub14 lic is deeply skeptical of the World Health Organiza15 tion, its leadership, and its independence from the 

16 pernicious political influence of certain member 

17 states, including the People’s Republic of China; 

18 (2) Congress strongly prefers that any agree19 ment related to pandemic prevention, preparedness, 

20 and response adopted by the World Health Assembly 

21 pursuant to the work of the INB be considered a 

22 treaty requiring the advice and consent of the Sen23 ate, with two-thirds of Senators concurring; 

24 (3) the scope of the agreement which the INB 

25 has been tasked with drafting, as outlined by the DiVerDate Sep 11 2014 21:11 Aug 30, 2024 Jkt 049200 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\H1425.RH H1425

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1 rector-General, is so broad that any application of 

2 the factors referred to in section 2(11) will weigh 

3 strongly in favor of it being considered a treaty; and 

4 (4) given the level of public distrust, any rel5 evant new agreement by the World Health Assembly 

6 which cannot garner the two-thirds vote needed for 

7 Senate ratification should not be agreed to or imple8 mented by the United States. 

9 SEC. 4. ANY WORLD HEALTH AGENCY CONVENTION OR 

10 AGREEMENT OR OTHER INTERNATIONAL IN11 STRUMENT RESULTING FROM THE INTER12 NATIONAL NEGOTIATING BODY’S FINAL RE13 PORT DEEMED TO BE A TREATY SUBJECT TO 

14 ADVICE AND CONSENT OF THE SENATE. 

15 Notwithstanding any other provision of law, any con16 vention, agreement, or other international instrument on 

17 pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response reached 

18 by the World Health Assembly pursuant to the rec19 ommendations, report, or work of the International Nego20 tiating Body established by the second special session of 

21 the World Health Assembly is deemed to be a treaty that 

22 is subject to the requirements of article II, section 2, 

23 clause 2 of the Constitution of the United States, which 

24 requires the advice and consent of the Senate, with two25 thirds of Senators concurring. 


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Union Calendar No. 540 

118TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. R. 1425 

[Report No. 118–643] 

A BILL 

To require any convention, agreement, or other 

tion. Health Assembly to be subject to Senate ratificapreparedness, and response reached by the World international instrument on pandemic prevention, 

AUGUST 30, 2024 

Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the 

State of the Union and ordered to be printed 


ssavage on LAPJG3WLY3PROD with BILLS