Brain Food for Pioneering Spirits: does the WHO run on 50 cents a person, and does that make it powerless — or does it just mean the real leverage lies somewhere else entirely? In Room #902 of the Deep Talk Club, under our overarching theme “Pioneering Spirit with brAIn,” the group weighs the Gates Foundation’s outsized influence on WHO funding against its record on smallpox eradication and alcohol advertising bans, questions why North Korea just won a seat on the WHO executive board, and asks whether expanding the WHO’s pandemic powers is prevention — or a permanent expansion of “authorization” built on humanity’s oldest fears. Listen in on the examples that came up and the perspectives that emerged in dialogue…
Note: This session was recorded live in German as part of the Deep Talk Club, so the video above is German-language audio only. What follows is an English translation of the conversation, lightly edited for readability — the back-and-forth between the moderator and participants is preserved, but the original timestamps and speaker names have been left out.
A very good morning to you. Today we’re talking about the WHO under our overarching theme “Pioneering Spirit with brAIn.” We’ve picked up various technological developments there, kept going to show connections, and now we’re also picking up societal and political topics, in order to bring various connections together later and abstract them back to the overarching theme, Pioneering Spirit with brAIn, and show the connections. So I’m really looking forward to, and really curious about, the exchange we’ll have today regarding the WHO — what advantages and disadvantages does a global health policy unfold, is the question we want to and will address today. And what characterizes us, or characterizes this room, is ultimately that it’s not at all about being an expert in a field, but rather bringing together various things we’ve observed, whether that’s from the media, whether we’re maybe deeper into the topics, and together in exchange, in a dialogue, looking and being able to generate new insights for ourselves. In that sense, as every morning, you’re warmly invited to join, to shape a space of reflection here together today. And at this point, once more for those joining for the first time today, a reminder that the room is recorded the entire time, and the content will accordingly be published later too. That means if you join, you automatically agree to that. Whoever doesn’t want that for whatever reason, wants to stay anonymous or similar, of course also has the option to simply use the chat, to maybe put in various thoughts, questions or similar. And then we can pick up on one thing or another during the roughly 60 minutes we’ve planned here, and address it. Yes, the WHO — we’ve already picked up various aspects over the past days. Among other things, it already came up on the margins in passing regarding a digital patient record, and we showed advantages as well as disadvantages that can arise from that. And especially in the context of the corona pandemic, the WHO probably really came into focus for many people for the first time, so being able to feel more clearly in perception that there is a World Health Organization at all. That’s a specialized organization of the United Nations, headquartered in Geneva. That’s roughly the information, if you look at Wikipedia. And if you look, you can pick up various things. So on one hand, we find here regarding the fact that there are 194 UN states, that the WHO was originally founded in 1948. The headquarters in Geneva I already mentioned. And that the goal, basically, is to take care of the health of all people, independent of the interests of individual, especially wealthy, states. And in this context it’s also about, possibly, centrally steering various things. And one person or another of you might have already caught wind of the discussions, developments currently taking place, in the direction that the WHO is increasingly getting more areas of competence, how can you put it, more power of office, so to speak, due to the member states signing an agreement here, so that in the future it should be able to, for example, declare pandemics and so on, and accordingly should then also get the possibility or authority to look at, among other things, what measures need to be taken worldwide, for example, to get a pandemic under control, and as quickly as possible. Exactly. And yes, those are the first thoughts or impulses I can bring in, to call one thing or another to mind for you already, to remind you of things you might have heard, and accordingly to come into exchange together, and see what that would actually mean. So on one hand looking, can we address what the WHO has actually achieved or done so far, what it’s responsible for, and then look at what the developments are, which direction should things actually go? What’s the plan? What advantages and disadvantages might result from that? And how is a globally viewed health policy developing here too? That’s what we want to talk about together today. Yes, and with that I’d like to mute myself first, and see who’d like to join first this morning. Or actually I don’t need to mute myself at all, because Marc has already raised his hand directly. A very good morning, dear Marc. What do you say about the topic?
Dear Yasemin, good morning. I have to smile right now, especially at the last sentences. Good morning to the others. Sorry, sorry, sorry, I’m already fully in the flow again.
Yes, what could happen?
Oh, honestly, dear Yasemin, I’m totally relaxed about that. Because with what we’ve experienced in recent months and years, contracts are just paper. And I know what you’re alluding to — if the WHO, for example, says, there’s a pandemic now, then of course they’d have an insane power to clearly dictate to a country too. But by now that doesn’t worry me anymore, because we’ve learned that contracts exist — for me that’s a guideline, you stick to it too, but who ultimately says, if you look at it that way, whether we’re also a democracy, whether ultimately we also have to fulfill everything that’s written in such contracts. So that doesn’t worry me per se now, or wouldn’t be an argument for me to say the WHO needs to, because this and that could happen in that case.
Yes, thank you so, so much. However, in this context the question of course arises how the contracts are structured, if these are of course contracts in which, for example, a sanction is also stipulated. If, for example, what happens in case of non-compliance, then the situation looks quite different, right, dear Marc?
There too I’d, I have to grin, contracts, who cares, well, we unfortunately have people like the former American president, we have people in Turkey, we have leaders worldwide, that’s paper. Sanctions also have to be prosecuted first. Of course there are jurisdictions, but until that’s enforced, it can happen. I fully agree with you that it can happen and that you keep an eye on it. And I engaged with the WHO a bit yesterday, and found it totally interesting. Dear Yasemin, thanks for the topic. I didn’t know, for example, if we first look at, who’s actually behind it? So the WHO actually hangs by a thin thread. The funds are frozen, and they come from mandatory contributions that aren’t being raised anymore. Some countries are even no longer paying their mandatory contributions. So the WHO hangs really, really firmly on the thread of one organization, and that organization is the Gates Foundation. You might have heard that name before, sounds familiar, especially if you have a computer. And that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. But what I found really, really exciting, when you look at all the good the WHO does — I’ll get to that later too — but since the WHO is dependent on this foundation, so on the donor, and that’s, from this foundation, four billion euros annually, of course they also have a big say, that’s clear. If I were to give someone four billion euros, I’d also want to say where the money goes. And it turns out, for example, that this foundation wants, on health questions, to do it fastest with medications and with vaccination. So, parenthesis open, I’m not an anti-vaxxer, but the background of that is, it’s done with vaccination because that’s the fastest way to combat things to some extent. And when you combat things, you demonstrate successes, and when you demonstrate successes, you also find new investors. And there are really strong discussions happening right now, where the WHO, or where there are groups within the WHO who say, we need to work on the health systems in the individual countries, because that’s more effective than just vaccinating and then immediately reacting with vaccination. Although a vaccination is important. I just want to say with that, that the approach of maintaining or improving health in the countries, well, there are different approaches to solving that. And these approaches are of course also determined by those who give the money. And the most important foundation, as I said, is the Gates Foundation there.
Yes, thank you so, so much. And the tenor I’m picking up from what you’re saying, ultimately, is to some extent that paper is patient. Who even cares about contracts or agreements or arrangements that get made at some point? That means, ultimately a country can always withdraw again or similar. In that sense it’s neither threatening nor a danger or anything else. Maybe that also opens up doors at one point or another that can be welcomed too. I’m really curious how the others see this. So then the question arises, why do we even do it in the first place, if it doesn’t create any bindingness, in quotation marks, anyway? So why does it need any form of commitment, or an agreement, of how we want to move in sync here, or want to have a central body steer the whole thing? And with that I’d like to very, very warmly invite the others too, to join the round and give your perspective too. Do you see it similarly? Do you see it differently? Are there further doors that can be opened here, and accordingly to approach the topic from different perspectives too? Marc, what do you say to that? Do we even need an agreement at all, if we don’t have to stick to it anyway?
Dear Yasemin, thank you, you’re taking me back to school. But of course we need contracts. I even make contracts within my own family, specifically when it comes to money. For founding my company, I got money from my father, and it was really, really important to me that we make a contract, because you can argue even within a family. And when you get married, I can only tell you all, I’ll take care of that in advance. Contracts are there to give us security. Contracts make things easier when a dispute arises. And disputes can happen anywhere, even in a family. That can happen in the best family. But experience tells us, contracts aren’t, I’ll say, a means that protects us above all. It gives us security, it gives us rules to work with. But when we meet people, which is also happening right now worldwide, especially with Ukraine, who don’t look at contracts, who don’t care about agreements, then that won’t help us. Then the processes continue too. And those are just exceptional cases too. And the exception shouldn’t determine our actions. I’m a fan of contracts, because they make coexistence easier, and because it prevents disputes, well, it reduces disputes, and it helps lawyers reach a verdict faster too, when everything is well regulated. So I’m definitely, contracts yes, a clear yes.
Yes, thank you so, so much. But here the question also arises whether that’s even a contract at all, or what the differentiation might be to an agreement, where a kind of self-commitment is behind it, so to speak, and to what extent that’s even comparable to a regular contract, so to speak, which then also establishes corresponding possibilities for jurisdiction and so on. So I find that quite, quite interesting. Dear Jürgen, a very good morning. What do you say about the topic?
Good morning, dear Yasemin, good morning, Marc, and everyone in the room. My starting point was the question, do we even need such an agreement at all? And the second sub-area…
I can’t hear you right now. I don’t know if it’s just me, dear Jürgen. I did hear the second sub-area, and after that the audio was gone for me.
Jürgen, briefly, unfortunately I couldn’t hear you, or we couldn’t hear you. Could you please start again from the second sub-area? From there you weren’t audible to us anymore.
Can you hear me now?
Now we can hear you again, exactly. From the second sub-area you weren’t audible to us anymore.
Okay, second sub-area, as I said, regarding the question of what it’s actually all for, and what’s behind this development toward the WHO and the transfer of responsibility to the WHO, I just want to briefly touch on that. But first the “what,” and maybe to shed some light on that, I looked at — what do we actually have right now, when it comes to a pandemic? And we’ve had, since Corona, a fairly rigid, I’ll call it, infection protection law. And if you reflect on what happened during Corona, politically in this country, to get this pandemic under control, then under the guise of this infection protection law and the corresponding adjustments, which suddenly went very quickly in this country — I say that quite deliberately with a certain sarcasm — a whole lot was set in motion and changed, that would have actually been almost unthinkable before, certainly at that speed, and maybe also content-wise. I think, indeed, in the direction of undermining quite specific fundamental rights, and especially in the way open and fact-based exchange of opinions has changed. But that’s just noted on the side. We have — in my view, we have a profound legal basis anchored in our legal system for how we deal with pandemics. And the second thing I looked at is a typical economist’s throw. It’s called — what’s actually the critical mass? What are we talking about? We’re increasingly talking, when we talk about amounts, allow me this, when we talk about amounts in connection with politics, those are thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, not a topic anymore. Everything only plays out in the realm of billions now. And suddenly, I’ll say now, it’s written on the wall, everything that potentially takes on a bigger, far-reaching dimension is suddenly a pandemic. And I looked, there’s a list of pandemics, I can’t say right now who’s mainly responsible for that, but I could certainly research that too, and I looked at the pandemics of recent years, I’ll spare you the listing of what and how, regarding the deaths. That’s, for me, forgive me, the critical mass, to substantiate the whole thing. Corona was certainly a pandemic. Absolutely fine. There you’re talking about over 20 million deaths in this world, however they were defined. The subsequent or preceding pandemics — we live, so for example, there are still so-called influenza, so flu pandemics, I don’t want to belittle that, that’s actually the original template of a pandemic for me. There are still pandemics regarding measles. We had an Ebola pandemic, a dengue pandemic, a Zika fever pandemic. So, and now I look at the deaths, and there it says, for example, numbers like worldwide 2,237, at least 910, at least 22, more than 3,000.
The audio is gone again right now, dear Jürgen. I don’t know if you can hear us again already. Let’s just take a look.
So, now the audio was briefly gone again, dear Jürgen.
Can you hear me?
I still caught “at least 22.”
At least 22 was a figure that resulted from one particular pandemic. And to round that off and come to a conclusion now, I’ll say, when I look at these critical masses, mind you, Corona aside, it’s apparently being instrumentalized for a quite specific other reason. This current panic and fear of possible future pandemics, for some purpose. And I said at the beginning, I want to leave that open and see to what extent the discussion develops in that direction. For me personally, let me say this in closing, it’s like with many things, indeed a characteristic of our time. We have something, we have something that in most cases has turned out to work. And we have to note that now someone, or somebody, some organization crawls out of some corner and says, yes, we need a completely different approach. And that makes me suspicious, and I ask myself, what for? And that was exactly this question, which I’ll leave open for now. Maybe it’ll develop in that direction. Thank you for the long and interrupted listening. Sorry about that.
Yes, thank you so, so much. Marc, yes, you want to connect directly.
Yes, dear Jürgen, I hope we know each other well. We also talk on the phone. I’m smiling — I just made myself a coffee. I’m not smiling about your statement, but rather I want to do what I learned from you, and look at the title, which is “The WHO.” What’s it good for, what do they do? And I only smiled because the discussion disappears at lightning speed. What’s the WHO, what do they do, where’s it going? Into the discussion, how do we deal with pandemics, what role does the state have? And what happens to us there? That’s what I noticed, I wanted to point that out.
Yes, and what exactly does that mean for you, dear Marc?
No, that means for me first that you too, Jürgen, who’s also a person with emotions, that we have certain topics that occupy us very much. And I just want to say, regarding the WHO topic, before we move away from it, because Jürgen said, where’s the discussion going, what are we talking about today, so that I’m not today the unfortunate one who leaves the room and says my questions weren’t answered. That’s just a little sidebar. And I think Jürgen knows how that’s meant. And one point that’s still really important to me, because we just talked about pandemics too — regardless of what we’re talking about, what strikes me again and again, and this is now away from the discussion, but what strikes me again and again is, today we’re either for something or against something. But for me the world is gray, not black and not white. And you have total problems, or I have total problems, sometimes exchanging with people about that. That only works here at the Deep Talk Club, because here I’ve never been attacked for having different opinions stand side by side, for talking about it factually and scientifically. But otherwise almost every discussion, whether written, on LinkedIn or other platforms, degenerates into for and against. So we’re in a group, or not in a group, for or against. And that’s why I appreciate this room so much, because it’s about the exchange of facts, dear Yasemin, compliment to you, and because you also give people the feeling, always, that if it should ever escalate, that we’re always moving on a safe stage here too, and don’t get attacked. And I appreciate that a lot.
Yes, thank you so, so much. Let’s look together once more at these advantages and disadvantages of a global health policy, and look at it from this perspective. That means, there are quite obviously certain positive aspects that can be opened up in this context, and also dangers that can be opened up in this context. And if we really now open up both perspectives, so to speak, and look at it — if you look at some things online about this, what’s actually the idea behind it, that’s, among other things, for example ensuring a stronger, sustainable, and long-term political engagement at the level of heads of state and government worldwide. It says here, for example, at the European Council of the European Union, an international agreement for pandemic prevention and preparedness, for example. And this whole pandemic issue is an aspect that really essentially falls under this too. That means it’s about clear procedures and tasks being defined, expanding long-term public and private support at all levels, and promoting the integration of health issues into all relevant policy areas. That’s at least what the European Council has officially announced in this context, and is also accessible online. So, and what’s an international pandemic agreement for, is the question here. There it says something like early detection, prevention of pandemics, resilience to future pandemics, response to pandemics, especially by ensuring universal and equitable access to medical solutions like vaccines, medications, and diagnostics. A stronger international framework for the health sector, with the WHO as the coordinating authority for global health issues. The concept “One Health,” in quotation marks, in which the health of people, animals, and our planet are interconnected. Those are the statements we find here on this level. What do you say about that?
Yes, gladly, Jürgen.
Dear Yasemin, I looked at this page too. Following our pandemic law, I asked myself what’s the next higher normative level we have here in Europe, and that’s the EU. And I came across exactly this page too. And I always do it this way, when possible — I do this a lot in my own correspondence too — that I highlight, from my point of view, important positions in bold. And I quite deliberately abstained from sequential reading and just looked at what they highlight on their page. And there, as the first point, jumps out at me, and at you too, since you read the page — legally binding under international law. That already made me pause for breath. You know I’m very particular about terminology. Legally binding on one hand, and international law, not related to states, but to international law. Makes me suspicious. The second thing that’s highlighted, I quote, “stronger, sustainable, long-term political engagement. Clear procedural tasks. Clear public and private support at all levels. Integration of health issues into all relevant product areas.” End quote. What I don’t find is a reference — I would have expected, that’s my personal expectation, that at least in the first area of this statement, keeping the dangers to the life and health of the people affected by the pandemic as low as possible, or providing preventive care, in the case of it happening providing care, and providing follow-up care after the pandemic has been overcome, would appear. I don’t find that. And that’s why, dear Marc, you’re absolutely right, and I’m, I think, actually quite strongly and quite openly emotion-driven, and within me these two inner views between emotion and facts are always fighting, as I think is the case with everyone. But in this case, right now the emotional part predominates, because I’m reflecting on what’s happened in recent years. And I ask myself whether this last pandemic — and now we’re at this second point — whether this last pandemic, Covid, is being used by various bodies to a certain extent as the instrument of a potential panic for a relatively easier way of leading and governing through — and I wouldn’t say peoples, but states, and by states and alliances of states. I’m deliberately putting that as a question, but I clearly tend toward this motivation, this motivational direction of this action. Thank you for listening.
Yes, thank you so, so much. And here the question also arises for me, if we maybe also open up a parallel, or parallels, to other centrally steered agreements, I’ll say now. So agreements of any kind. We could think directly of something like NATO. We could think of something like the IPCC, which is also about climate and such aspects. And we could also maybe open up this door again, also comparatively, to look, quite generally, what advantages and disadvantages, well we also had that room with the aspect of centralization, decentralization and so on. What role do such agreements etc. play, that are made at various levels, so what advantages they bring, and what disadvantages they certainly also bring, and then against the background of past events, if you look at the developments, what developments can be observed here too, that maybe also lead to, against the background that there were certain developments, seeing advantages on one hand, but also disadvantages on the other hand, such as, for example, what interests are actually behind it, who are the donors and so on. You just talked, for example, about amounts in the billions in this context. That doesn’t just apply to the WHO, but also to other central agreements steered by someone, in quotation marks. That means unbelievable amounts of money flow into this too, playing a role, also in the context of this consideration. So on one hand, who are the donors? On the other hand, what’s the money used for? And what interests are behind that too? So looking at that level too. And I’d like to pick up one or two comments from the chat, and then we can gladly draw connections again too, at the points where you’d like to connect too. First, Tobias asked the question, isn’t the WHO there to undermine the government? Wasn’t Corona the reason to prepare for this? If so, what will the next pandemic look like? Then Elke also contributed, why do many always like to look only at the death toll, in quotation marks. I have a lot of sympathy for the long-term victims, because that’s exactly where everyday life and the ability to earn a living becomes barely possible. The long-term consequences disproportionately often mean exclusion from the community. That’s why all victims should be considered. Incredibly many stateless people, so you can only reach all people with peoples. So, and I’ll just leave that standing there, and see, would one person or another like to connect at some point here? Marc, Jürgen?
Gladly Marc, and then Jürgen.
I’d like to answer the question about the donors again. This is curated information, so I can’t say it’s 100 percent accurate, but the main donor is the Gates Foundation, and I read in my research that if Bill Gates pulls his money out of the WHO, then it basically won’t exist anymore. Then it’s finished, because President Trump has also already written that they’re getting less money. So the WHO consists of member states, which have mandatory contributions. These mandatory contributions haven’t been raised, and just so you have an idea, simply an order of magnitude of how much money the WHO has available — with 7.8 billion people, 50 cents per — so that’s all the money they have, 50 cents per person on Earth they can do something with. That’s the wealth the WHO has. Regarding pandemics, we already talked about pandemics, you can only say, yes, there it’s justified to look at how effective the WHO is, because they’re also criticized for having reacted too slowly or wrongly to the Ebola outbreak in Africa back then, as well as to swine flu. I can’t give more precise background right now, but we just talked about pandemics. At the same time, now to say something positive, the WHO also eradicated smallpox. So it’s not like everything is only bad. And I’ll bring the economy into play again, which we also haven’t talked about yet. The economy depends on us selling a lot and making profit. And sugar is a really, really big problem, and there too the WHO has an eye on it, saying, watch out, dear food companies, the products you’re selling there are making us sick, they’re unhealthy. There too it’s at least good that some people put their finger on the wound, to tell the industry, what you’re doing here isn’t okay, because sugar feeds our brain, that ensures we always need more, more and more. So it’s not that the WHO now only intends to take over world domination and declare a pandemic. And still we have to keep an eye on it. This contribution was really important to me too.
Yes, thank you so, so much, Marc. Let me just briefly follow up, either in your direction or quite generally — how sensible is it even, to break down the funds made available to one citizen, since the WHO ultimately doesn’t carry out any measures itself, in the sense of, so if, for example, a vaccination is introduced now, it’s not the case that the WHO takes the money for that into its own hands, but rather that’s a central body that ultimately defines something as measures that should be taken, for example. And ultimately the countries are then allowed to implement that accordingly and also bear the costs for it. That means, I personally don’t quite follow whether it’s even meaningful at all to break down the amounts, sums of money here, to one citizen, and say, that’s not that much money that’s available there, but rather the question is, what is the money actually used for? And that’s, for example, well, to fund their structures and so on, and staff, or such costs possibly, but not to pay for the measures that are carried out afterward. Would you like to say something more about that?
Yes, that’s an interesting point, I hadn’t considered that. To say something about that now would be barroom chatter, but I can well imagine, this is just a gut response — I can very well imagine that a lot of money goes into administration. Then I could just, with a wink, in parentheses, do we even need the EU then? If you look at what that costs, the European Parliament and so on, how much money is spent, I’ll say, on a building? Couldn’t you do that with a Zoom conference and so on? And still, those are always the two sides, we see what we want to see. I can look left, look right, look straight ahead, and that’s an important question, good question, that I can’t answer that way, because it eludes my knowledge exactly where the funds flow, how much money is spent on administration, and, and, and since you opened up the discussion, Christmas is coming up again soon, does it even make sense to donate anything anywhere, if the donation organizations need the money to be administered, and with that I don’t want to say we shouldn’t ask critically, I’ve learned that, but it’s so complex. We notice again, every topic is so complex that I really find it hard to give a satisfying answer to that for you or for Jürgen. That’s how it is and that’s right, but I can’t answer the question. That would have been the short version.
Let me formulate my question differently again, or my point differently. It wasn’t at all about questioning whether it even makes sense to spend money on such structures at all, but my question was whether it makes sense to break down the money available to the WHO or another central body, so to speak, per citizen at this point. That just didn’t make sense to me, because ultimately these funds are, for example, spent on administrative structures etc., but not to finance measures. That was just the point I wanted to make at this point. And that’s why I asked the question, it could have been that you had another point to say, we still have to break it down per citizen because… but I think that’s not given at this point. And it wasn’t at all about questioning whether the EU or the WHO or something, whether that’s sensible per se. You could of course ask that question quite generally, but that wasn’t what I was getting at now, but rather just this view broken down per citizen. And I think that doesn’t make that much sense in this context.
Marc, go ahead.
Yes, then I apologize for that contribution, because I just brought that in because numbers fascinate me, I brought the number in without going deeper into what’s done with these numbers. The topic was simply the WHO. Who is that? So I researched, who’s the WHO? How much budget does the WHO have available? And the WHO, if the WHO also has tasks, so improving health, health systems maybe everywhere in the world, then you need money for that, then you have to fly there and so on, and that should just be an order of magnitude, that of the power, without knowing where the money flows, to be able to show the size of the WHO. And then I maybe brought this into the wrong context, also in your head, which of course gives a completely, completely different discussion. I can understand your point, and I also agree with you that breaking it down to the individual citizen isn’t sensible, but rather the question is more, what budget does the WHO have available, and where exactly is that used, what’s it used for, and I can’t answer that question, because I haven’t read up on that.
Yes wonderful, thank you so, so much. Jürgen, you wanted to connect again too.
Yes, I actually wanted to give feedback on your remarks regarding the question, is it worth breaking it down? Sorry if I get a bit sloppy with my language now, but that’s just as much nonsense as this conscious gentleman who’s always statistically invoked — clear statement from me, no, that doesn’t make any sense at all, because we’re talking about a complexity, and now I’m at the second topic, which is really essential for me in connection with the WHO, if I look at what such an organization exists for. And dear Marc, thank you for your question. That question I’d like to answer quite clearly from my personal point of view too. What do we actually still need an EU for? I’ll position myself now and say, an EU like we currently have, we don’t actually need, because the effort, or the contributions demanded of us as citizens, are in no relation to the output that benefits us. But that’s certainly a different, certainly a different topic, I don’t want to elaborate on that further now, but it hits the actual point. And let me say one more thing, dear Marc, I know you certainly see this the same way in the background too — when a Mr. Bill Gates puts billions of his wealth into an endeavor to do something good, then for me that’s fundamentally good. The question is then, to what extent is he able to significantly steer and influence the handling and use of this money, for — and sorry, I keep coming back to the point — what for? And, dear Yasemin, breaking it down per capita for everyone doesn’t make sense in that respect, because from the experiences of the Corona pandemic in dealing with, or in the WHO’s actions, it turned out that the essential thing that came out was these enormous cases of corruption and entanglements and cronyism, which then also, if I remember correctly, led to the removal of the head of the WHO, or to a strong questioning of the WHO. That means we again have one of our root problems. We have an institution trying to get a hold of a meanwhile gigantic complexity, with an almost necessarily excessive bureaucracy, because the detail problems of this complexity make this bureaucracy necessary to understand them. But what gets lost is whether that has any benefit in any form. And please look at the developments and the results and the measures in the Corona pandemic. In my opinion, I come to the conclusion that this pandemic was contained, not through a globally overarching instrument or organization led by some authority, but no, it increasingly led to national actions and interests coming to the forefront, and many nations — I’m also thinking of us, of our BioNTech, I’m thinking of Pfizer in America, I’m thinking of the confrontation and the strict isolation of the different approach in China, not to mention Russia — that exactly this actually led to the opposite of what we’re currently struggling with, namely this dissolution of the deliberately and consciously advanced complexity back into a manageable fractal organization, so to speak, which then takes effect in a certain sub-area and possibly works more advantageously there than compared to other things, and that bothers some people. Thank you for listening.
Yes, thank you so, so much, and in this context I’d like to make the connection again to this overarching theme, Pioneering Spirit with brAIn. We’ve repeatedly emphasized that on one hand it’s important to look at the topic blocks we’re working on individually first, to reduce the complexity, so to speak, but then to see them in connections again too, and pick up and incorporate the complexity again too. And yesterday, among other things, in the climate context, what I said, I also shared a link in the chat, which I brought in again today too. “The Heat is On” by Bjørn Lomborg, “On the Summer’s Record Heat.” For those of you who understand English well, I can only recommend also taking a look at that in this context too. It’s actually about the topic of climate, but various connections are also made here, and parallels are drawn to dealing with the Corona pandemic too. And numbers, data, facts are also picked up here too — very neutrally, by the way, so not as blaming or anything, but rather to clarify which perspectives need to be opened up here, and also to consider, also in the context of activities or plans, in the context of climate events, considering that again too and incorporating various aspects, and also looking at the effects. And especially with these developments and with the decisions that were also made regarding the measures in the context of the Corona pandemic, it’s also about, among other things, looking at what follow-up costs actually resulted from these measures, which were also foreseeable, so weren’t surprising now, but the numbers, data, facts were already available, and opening up these doors too. We’d already talked about how every decision, every measure, or also non-decisions in the sense of doing nothing, is ultimately always connected with a price, so to speak, and that’s why it’s also important and sensible to look at it from various perspectives, and see what chain reactions are triggered, and is that proportionate? And meanwhile there are also some decisions on this, which, especially at the level of the Corona pandemic, also show that certain measures that were taken weren’t proportionate, or can’t be judged as proportionate, independent of the financial effects that exist in this context. And it’s really important there to see these connections too, and against the background of the connections on these various levels, to also take that into account in this debate that’s being conducted, or the debates that are being conducted, and to look, are we on the right path, in quotation marks, there. Then you can pick up further aspects too, and that’s maybe another impulse I’d like to bring in too, because I’m also interested in what you say about it, or how you feel about it. I also find it interesting, and that was also one of the news items that actually led to discussions here, that the World Health Organization, with a meeting that took place, elected North Korea, together with the member states, into the WHO executive board, and thereby sits accordingly in the leadership level of a powerful authority, and at the same time there are also efforts to expand the WHO’s authorizations. And here we’re now right at this aspect, also with these entanglements, corruption and so on, interests, if we look at it again from this perspective, to also consider — so in other contexts there are efforts, for example, especially if we now pick up the war events, to say, we distance ourselves from Putin and so on and so forth, it also has to be sanctioned, that’s been the reaction in many places. And at the same time we’re waving through, in quotation marks, granting the WHO greater authorizations. And in the area of the executive board, someone from North Korea is, so to speak, freshly put into power. What does that mean, or are we here even, with our values and how we stand behind our values and how we deal with that? So we could also parallel, we’d also opened up Qatar as a discussion, and so on, when it was about the World Cup and such. So does that even fit together somehow, or don’t certain activities maybe stand in contradiction to each other here? Those are, I think, quite legitimate questions, where it’s really worth critically questioning whether the activities being carried out now, or that are planned, make that much sense against the background of, what do we actually want, or what are we doing the whole thing for? Marc, Jürgen, would you like to connect here again?
Jürgen, go ahead.
Yes, sorry, Marc, if I jump in here right away, because with the word “authorization,” all my alarm bells go off of course. But please cross that out, of course, but it’s definitely the case. And for me that’s exactly the fitting choice of words that I, sorry, that I use in this connection too. Authorization, taking power. And that, sorry, I keep coming back to this, two question words arise for me, once, with what, and once, for what. And now I’m not sticking my neck out either, definitely, as I said at the beginning, I’ll wait first and see if it develops in this direction. And even if someone calls me a tinfoil-hat wearer or a conspiracy theorist, I’ll gladly take up that discussion. But I say, if I try to answer these two questions, then this time I first won’t ask about the “what for” of this authorization, but the “with what.” And there are three hostages, the three hostages of our humanity, that goes back even to Albrecht Dürer with his apocalyptic riders. We have three, in our transience as beings on this earth. Three really essential hostages. That’s hunger, that’s war, and that’s death. And with these three hostages I have an instrument to answer this “with what,” namely to generate panic. Because every person, in the event of one of these manifestations occurring, these horror scenarios, reduces themselves to fighting and focusing on these root threats. And if I’m able to instrumentalize these three primal fears — I repeat again, this is my personal opinion — to instrumentalize these in some direction, intention, political intent, or also financial intent, then I definitely have an incredibly effective tool. And now comes the question, for what? To not just seize this power, but to cement it. And in summa summarum, I’m now at the concluding judgment that I actually didn’t want to give from the beginning, or my assessment. I see this action, with this strengthening of the, basically actually just oversized, organization and structure WHO, exactly in this direction, of undermining partial interests and steering things under a common, especially political, leadership in a quite specific direction. Please allow me this personal positioning. Thank you for listening, dear ones.
Yes, gladly, Marc.
I just want to, because today I, just so he understands too, this gives me incredible joy in the discussion, to always give the counterpart, so it stays interesting. And today I’m a WHO man. And that’s why I want to say again, when we talk about pandemics, then you also have to know that all diseases, or more or less non-communicable diseases, account for more than two-thirds of global deaths. So sorry, non-communicable diseases. These include heart attacks, strokes, chronic lung diseases, and cancer. When we discuss pandemics, I understand your aspect, dear Jürgen, then we haven’t had that many pandemics yet. I’ll be done immediately, Jürgen, just one more thing. And that’s why I want to say, what was the WHO good for? We don’t see many things at all. Among other things, that was the advertising ban for alcohol.
Now I can’t hear you anymore, dear Marc.
I did just catch “advertising ban for alcohol.” Can you repeat that again please, Marc?
“Advertising ban for alcohol.”
I don’t know now exactly if it’s my network or your network, Marc. I didn’t catch the end, so to speak. I did catch advertising ban for alcohol. Can you give me a thumbs up? Is it working again now with the…
Yes, it’s working for me again now. No, that was just — I just wanted to say, it’s not only bad things. We just don’t see many things at all. And among other things, that’s the advertising ban for alcohol, the effort against too much sugar in food, and the fight against, and almost that there’s no more smallpox — sorry if there is still smallpox somewhere, I’m not a doctor, but good things have happened too. And that’s why I always find it so important that I quite gladly take the opposing position in a discussion, so that we simply have multiple opinions. That doesn’t always have to align with my opinion. But it would be boring if we all spoke for or against the same thing.
Yes, absolutely. And it’s supposed to open up different perspectives too, so I find that important at this point too. And yes, given the time, I’d like to slowly start wrapping up today. So I’d like to move into the closing round now. What are the insights, so to speak, that we’re taking away, or maybe thoughts that we were able to structure for ourselves through this discussion, to maybe slightly shift from your previous position, or new questions that have arisen, or also to say all the more, that’s confirmed for me again. So that’s also a possibility. There are various options available, and in that sense I’m curious what you’d like to highlight again in the closing round. Marc, would you like to start?
Yes, I’m very, very grateful to both of you, because Jürgen also made me aware again that we’re really everywhere talking about power, and I need to think further about that, fundamentally, that we think about power, that I think about power, about abuse of power, use of power, and thank you very much for the inspiration.
Thank you very much, Jürgen.
Yes, I’m very grateful that, allow me to say, dear Yasemin, from a feeling perspective, the topics have an increasing relevance to reality, to what affects us in everyday life, without the other topics we had, but that it’s going in this direction. And I appreciate it extraordinarily, to keep going into this kind of respectful “confrontation” with you, dear Marc, because for me too it always sets off new trigger points to grapple with, and calls me back to a certain basis. And for that I thank you, and for that once again my thanks to you, Yasemin, as always for the excellent moderation of such a complex topic. And I look forward to every day I can participate in, and will also continue to contribute vehemently as always, and wish you all a pleasant and nice day, dear ones. Ciao, bye.
Yes, thank you so, so much for these various perspectives we were able to open up together here. Both the contributions here on stage and via the chat, and also questions, also nice questions that keep coming in. So really not always necessarily providing answers, but also entering with questions, and trying, through questions, to approach various perspectives too and find answers, with the consideration always focusing on opening up these facets too, and at the same time making these connections too. And in that sense I think it’s definitely totally valuable, in this context, to build a bridge again to the closing round we had a few days ago, and to formulate that as a question again too. We talked in one of the rooms about the aspect of motivation, and in that context also talked about marketing and storytelling. And it was about the fact that there’s a moving-away-from and/or a moving-toward movement that you can use here, against the background of knowledge of how the brain works. And we addressed questions, where are we actually moving toward, or what’s the goal, or what’s the vision, where we want to go with one topic or another, and had opened up, among other things, considering whether politics too shouldn’t maybe also make greater use of storytelling here, against the background of how our brain works, or can be steered. And the hint came from the audience that they certainly already do that. However, and then we established, however, the question is, in what way? And is it the moving-away-from movement or the moving-toward movement that’s being steered here? And while on one hand, maybe also as a point of criticism regarding, well, how are they labeled? Conspiracy theorists, tinfoil-hat wearers and so on — I’ll just pick up the terms that are in the room, that keep being used in this context, so it’s clear what’s meant — it’s also debated, in quotation marks, according to the motto, they’re working with panic there, the developments are dramatic, and this is going in a direction we actually don’t want, and thoughts all the way to loss of democracy and so on. Now I’d like to open up the counter-question and say, what’s politics actually doing? Is it a moving-toward in the marketing or in the storytelling being used here, or aren’t we maybe even observing a moving-away-from or a fear movement over the last three years? So that means, what’s basically accused of the tinfoil-hat wearers or the conspiracy theorists, in quotation marks, I’ll call it that, isn’t that exactly the same strategy being used here by politics and the media, in quotation marks, to set something in motion or in movement with fear, so to speak, and to steer developments? And I want quite deliberately to leave that unanswered, but simply take it along as food for thought, and maybe over the next few days, whenever you observe media, read newspapers and so on, and maybe watch documentaries or similar, just put your focus on this point, and try to find answers for yourself. I think that can also help at one point or another, to sort your own thoughts again, and see what this focus or this direction of view means, looking from this perspective. And in that sense it’s obvious that, following on from this room, we’ll continue tomorrow with the question, so as the room topic “Democracy in Danger?” And in which direction is our society actually currently changing? What developments can we observe against the background of forms of governance we know, things like federalism, democracy, sociology, monarchy and so on. And I’m also really, really curious about the various perspectives and points of view we can open up here, to simply reflect again in exchange, and consider what’s actually happening there, and what movements can we discover for ourselves in one direction or the other, and what does that mean for us in the sense of, what standpoint do I have, what attitude do I have, or where might I also step back from one way of thinking or another, and open up new windows at this point and generate new perspectives. And in that sense I thank you all very, very much, as I said, for the intensive participation, and look forward to tomorrow morning at eight, and yes, to what emerges together in the room again then. In that sense, a wonderful day and see you tomorrow. Ciao. Ciao!
