WHO chief welcomes Biden election win

The Director General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, congratulated Joe Biden on his U.S. election win on Monday (November 9) - and said he was looking forward to working closely with the new administration.

"We congratulate (U.S.) President-elect Joe Biden and Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris, and we look forward to working with his administration very closely. We need to re-imagine leadership, build on mutual trust and mutual accountability to end the pandemic and address the fundamental inequalities that lie at the root of so many of the world's problems."

Donald Trump has accused the WHO of being "China-centric" in its handling of the pandemic - a charge Tedros has repeatedly denied.

And Trump has frozen U.S. funding to the organization.

However, Biden has said he'd reverse the decision on his first day in office.

Tedros says funding remains an issue for the WHO.

"Predictable and sustainable funding remains one of the fundamental challenges for the future success of this organisation. For WHO to do its job, we must address the shocking and expanding imbalance between assets contributions and voluntary, largely earmarked funds. In the past decade, the world's expectations of WHO have grown dramatically, but our budget has barely changed."

Last week, an oversight panel called for reforms at the WHO.

They include "predictable and flexible" funding and setting up a multi-tiered system to warn countries earlier about disease outbreaks before they escalate.