763 



It would seem appropriate for the United States to utilize the au- 

 thority of WHO and the power of its international voice in the sup- 

 port of national as well as infernational programs. Tliis country has 

 the resources, the systems skills, and the biomedical technology for 

 making "WHO a better institution than it now is. The United States 

 can be the instrumentality for preparing and shaping WHO to manage 

 the common global health problems of the future. 



Yet WHO will shape nothing without stronger support than is now 

 evident for international health institutions, in the Congress or at 

 Secretarial levels in the Departments of State and of Health, Ed- 

 ucation and Welfare. The situation seems to be a most peculiar one for 

 world health, namely, commitment without involvement. The United 

 States is meeting its fiscal obligations to WHO and PAHO with very 

 little organizational evidence as yet that it also intends to play a posi- 

 tive determinant role -°^ in an area where American technical com- 

 petence is at its best, where its presence is least offensive, and indeed 

 where American leadership is fully expected by the rest of the world. 



Perhaps there is need to mount an educational program so that a 

 larger segment of the public is included in the discourse surrounding 

 the issues of national and global public health. The status of the 

 world's health might become a public issue; and that issue could 

 stimulate scientific, medical, and economic debate. For in the United 

 States, at least, debate is absolutely essential to both clarification and 

 political action. 



208 Ibid., page 2. 



