WHO launches science trust movement with 240 groups

The World Health Organization launched a global movement on Nov. 10 that it says unites more than 240 organizations behind a pledge to strengthen public trust in science and put evidence to work for better health.

Called Together for Science and Health, the movement was launched on World Science Day for Peace and Development with 12 events in different countries and regions, and is closely tied to the Paris Peace Forum, the WHO said. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and French President Emmanuel Macron led the launch.

The WHO said the movement will focus on three priorities: bringing science and society closer together, making better use of evidence when health policy is made, and improving how science is communicated and debated. Member organizations are expected to share methods, resources and lessons, and to build working partnerships.

“Science is one of humanity’s most powerful tools, and has always been the engine of better health,” Tedros said in the release, pointing to vaccines, medicines, disease prevention and outbreak response.

Dr. Sylvie Briand, the WHO’s chief scientist, said no single institution or country can build trust alone and described the movement as “a space for dialogue and collaboration, not polarization.”

The agency said rapid technological change and artificial intelligence are reshaping how people find, interpret and share scientific and health information, and that the movement aims to help people engage with evidence confidently. It invited organizations worldwide to join.

The release left several questions open. It did not name the 240 organizations, and the movement’s web page lists no members, so it is not clear whether any Canadian institutions have signed on. The page says the WHO does not fund participating organizations, which pay for their own activities, and it sets no numerical targets. Groups join through an online form and agree to a declaration of commitment setting out shared values and principles.

The launch caps a year in which the WHO built its World Health Day campaign around the theme “Together for health. Stand with science.” It also comes after the United States finalized its withdrawal from the WHO in January.

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Source: World Health Organization.

Featured image: WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in London, Nov. 20, 2023. File photo: Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons).