About this Committee

The World Health Organization, commonly referred to as the WHO, was established in 1948, with the purpose of serving as the agency in the United Nations that connects nations, partners, and people to promote: built on the ideal of attaining the highest state of health for everyone, everywhere. This committee is responsible for directing global efforts in universal health coverage, preparing responses to world health emergencies, and creating initiatives to address the social and environmental factors that comprise the broad umbrella of issues that make up our understanding of health and well-being. With the COVID-19 pandemic, it has become increasingly relevant that the local health crisis is an international health crisis, and that health as a category is something that affects and is affected by all spheres of life: social, economic, cultural, and political. Now, more than ever, the WHO must work together with all nations to come up with novel solutions to the systematic absences in our global healthcare structure. Our first topic of the year is “Access to Reproductive Healthcare”. As stated on the official WHO website, reproductive healthcare is a “state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity, in all matters relating to the reproductive system and to its functions and processes.” Related to that, our second topic of the year is “Menstrual Healthcare and Education”. In the WHO Statement on Menstrual Health and Rights, the committee has demanded for “menstrual health to be recognized, framed, and addressed as a health and human rights issue, not a hygiene issue.” The shame around menstrual health on a global scale has relegated the accessibility of services and information surrounding menstruation away from the public eye, while the barriers that lack of understanding, resources, and complications around this topic have created limit their life opportunities, “their rights to education, work, water and sanitation, non-discrimination and gender equality – and ultimately to health.” In short, understanding health as a global and universal phenomenon, the World Health Organization asks the global community to examine the structures in place that prevent lack of access to stigmatized areas of health so that all may live their lives to their fullest potential, in “their highest state of health.”