Origins

The International Sanitary Conferences, originally held on 23 June 1851, were the first
predecessors of the WHO. A series of 14 conferences that lasted from 1851 to 1938, the
International Sanitary Conferences worked to combat many diseases, chief among
them cholera, yellow fever, and the bubonic plague. The conferences were largely
ineffective until the seventh, in 1892; when an International Sanitary Convention that dealt
with cholera was passed.

Five years later, a convention for the plague was signed.[9] In part as a result of the
successes of the Conferences, the Pan-American Sanitary Bureau (1902), and the Office
International d'Hygiène Publique (1907) were soon founded. When the League of
Nations was formed in 1920, they established the Health Organization of the League of
Nations. After World War II, the United Nations absorbed all the other health organizations,
to form the WHO.[10]

Establishment
During the 1945 United Nations Conference on International Organization, Szeming Sze, a
delegate from the Republic of China, conferred with Norwegian and Brazilian delegates on
creating an international health organization under the auspices of the new United
Nations. After failing to get a resolution passed on the subject, Alger Hiss, the Secretary
General of the conference, recommended using a declaration to establish such an
organization. Sze and other delegates lobbied and a declaration passed calling for an
international conference on health.[11] The use of the word "world", rather than
"international", emphasized the truly global nature of what the organization was seeking to
achieve.[12] The constitution of the World Health Organization was signed by all 51
countries of the United Nations, and by 10 other countries, on 22 July 1946. [13] It thus
became the first specialized agency of the United Nations to which every member
subscribed.[14] Its constitution formally came into force on the first World Health Day on 7
April 1948, when it was ratified by the 26th member state. [13]
The first meeting of the World Health Assembly finished on 24 July 1948, having secured a
budget of US$5 million (then GB£1,250,000) for the 1949 year. Andrija Štampar was the
Assembly's first president, and G. Brock Chisholm was appointed Director-General of WHO,
having served as Executive Secretary during the planning stages. [12] Its first priorities were
to control the spread of malaria, tuberculosis and sexually transmitted infections, and to
improve maternal and child health, nutrition and environmental hygiene.[15] Its first
legislative act was concerning the compilation of accurate statistics on the spread and
morbidity of disease.[12] The logo of the World Health Organization features the Rod of
Asclepius as a symbol for healing.[16]

Operational history of WHO

Three former directors of the Global Smallpox Eradication Programme read the news that smallpox had
been globally eradicated, 1980

1947: The WHO established an epidemiological information service via telex, and by 1950

a mass tuberculosis inoculation drive using the BCG vaccine was under way.
1955: The malaria eradication programme was launched, although it was later altered in
objective. 1955 saw the first report on diabetes mellitus and the creation of
the International Agency for Research on Cancer.[17]
1958: Viktor Zhdanov, Deputy Minister of Health for the USSR, called on the World Health
Assembly to undertake a global initiative to eradicate smallpox, resulting in Resolution
WHA11.54.[18] At this point, 2 million people were dying from smallpox every year.[citation
needed]

1966: The WHO moved its headquarters from the Ariana wing at the Palace of Nations to a
newly constructed HQ elsewhere in Geneva.[17][19]
1967: The WHO intensified the global smallpox eradication by contributing $2.4 million
annually to the effort and adopted a new disease surveillance method.[20][21] The initial
problem the WHO team faced was inadequate reporting of smallpox cases. WHO
established a network of consultants who assisted countries in setting up surveillance and
containment activities.[22] The WHO also helped contain the last European outbreak
in Yugoslavia in 1972.[23] After over two decades of fighting smallpox, the WHO declared in
1979 that the disease had been eradicated – the first disease in history to be eliminated by
human effort.[24]
1967: The WHO launched the Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical
Diseases and the World Health Assembly voted to enact a resolution on Disability
Prevention and Rehabilitation, with a focus on community-driven care.

1974: The Expanded Programme on Immunization and the control programme

of onchocerciasis was started, an important partnership between the Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the World
Bank.

1977: The first list of essential medicines was drawn up, and a year later the ambitious
goal of "Health For All" was declared.

1986: The WHO began its global programme on HIV/AIDS. Two years later preventing
discrimination against sufferers was attended to and in 1996 UNAIDS was formed.

1988: The Global Polio Eradication Initiative was established.[17]

1998: WHO's Director-General highlighted gains in child survival, reduced infant mortality,
increased life expectancy and reduced rates of "scourges" such as smallpox and polio on
the fiftieth anniversary of WHO's founding. He, did, however, accept that more had to be
done to assist maternal health and that progress in this area had been slow.[25]
2000: The Stop TB Partnership was created along with the UN's formulation of
the Millennium Development Goals.

2001: The measles initiative was formed, and credited with reducing global deaths from
the disease by 68% by 2007.

2002: The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria was drawn up to improve
the resources available.[17]
2006: The organization endorsed the world's first official HIV/AIDS Toolkit for Zimbabwe,
which formed the basis for global prevention, treatment, and support the plan to fight
the AIDS pandemic.[26]

Overall focus
The WHO's Constitution states that its objective "is the attainment by all people of the
highest possible level of health".[27]