A Global Health Emergency is also known as Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
It is declared when a health risk meets two criteria: it affects people in more than one country and it needs international action.
Declaring PHEIC is not an easy decision for WHO.
Too early and it can affect trade and tourism of the source country; too late and the health risk can spread beyond control.
Once PHEIC is declared, each of the 194 WHO member countries is legally bound to report all PHEIC related events within 24 hours.
E.g. the countries must daily report certain/probable infection cases, death cases and responses-taken.
The declaration also gives authority to WHO to make ‘recommendations’ on travel, airport screenings and isolating patients to control the risk.
But WHO doesn’t have any enforcement authority; this means that WHO can’t take any action against countries which refuse to follow WHO’s recommendations.
So, the PHEIC declaration is more about requesting international cooperation and relies on peer pressure and public knowledge.
However, there are a few powers WHO can exercise in cases of PHEIC declaration.
E.g. it can source data about death cases etc. from non-governmental, private sources.
And it can share this data with other parties without consent from non-complying government.
A PHEIC can be caused by a chemical agent or a radio nuclear material as well.
