Tue, September 16, 2025
The chancellor is paving the way for the dubious World Health Organization to impose curfews, contact bans, lockdowns, and mandatory vaccinations on us more easily. Other countries are rejecting this, but Germany is surrendering.
“This law, in conjunction with the International Health Regulations (IHR), restricts the fundamental rights of physical integrity, personal freedom, privacy of correspondence and mail, and freedom of movement.”
This is stated in the draft law that the Federal Cabinet has approved and submitted to the Bundestag for a vote. In the coming days, Parliament is expected to pass the draft. (For reasons of readability, we have omitted the cross-references to various articles of the Basic Law in the quotation.) In the typical language of state lawyers, the work is called “Law on the Amendments of June 1, 2024, 08.09.2025 to the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR) of May 23, 2005.”
Behind this lies a new form of political control of citizens by the government – on the initiative of the World Health Organization (WHO).
The WHO in a power frenzy
A few months ago, the WHO made massive changes to its already highly controversial “International Health Regulations” (IHR) – and in doing so, significantly expanded its own powers.
The deadline for objections to these changes expired on July 19, 2025. Many countries objected, including the US, Argentina, Russia, Italy, Austria, Slovakia, and Israel.
Germany did not, which is why the new IHR will come into force here on September 19. This means that the IHR are binding on the Federal Republic under international law. And the provisions will not only apply here, but will also take precedence over national law in cases of doubt.
Our Basic Law stipulates that the Bundestag must approve such a far-reaching delegation of national competence to supranational organizations. That is why Friedrich Merz is now presenting this “approval law.” He is asking the Bundestag to relinquish precisely these fundamental powers. And the Bundestag will do so.
At the heart of the WHO's new powers is the declaration of a “pandemic emergency.” In future, the WHO Secretary-General will be able to do this (without any supervisory authority!) at his own discretion. The WHO can then issue “recommendations” to all its member states on how to deal with this emergency.
These include, among other things: travel restrictions, curfews, compulsory vaccination, and “measures against the spread of allegedly disinforming opinions and information” (more on this in a moment).
WHO member states are required to follow these recommendations.
Formally, they are not obliged to do so, but Germany's political class will do so in any case: as is well known, all of the above measures were imposed almost obsessively during the coronavirus pandemic, even without the WHO having “recommended” them.
Appeals become extremely difficult
If Germany restricts fundamental rights in a future “pandemic emergency,” it will be difficult or impossible for citizens to take action against it. This is because Germany's obligation under international law to comply with the IHR is a key argument for our courts to declare restrictions justified – and, crucially, without even examining the appropriateness of the measures.
Most courts have already played this game during the coronavirus pandemic: Up to the Federal Constitutional Court, Germany's judiciary has repeatedly avoided conducting its own factual and technical evidence gathering and examination. Instead, across all instances, it has repeatedly hidden behind the alleged scientific authority of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the Paul Ehrlich Institute (PEI), and the Standing Committee on Vaccination (STIKO).
The RKI files, at the latest, then showed that these supposedly independent institutions had in fact been following political pressure and, not infrequently, simply direct instructions. Nevertheless, our state lawyers did not correct their judgments afterwards.
In the future, the government and the courts will now be able to hide behind the “recommendations” of the WHO instead of behind the RKI, PEI, and STIKO.
With the IGD Approval Act, Friedrich Merz is paving the way for Germany to ultimately restrict the fundamental rights of its citizens on behalf of the WHO. My esteemed colleague Norbert Häring said something to this effect: The IGD respects the sovereign decision of the government to surrender its sovereignty to the WHO.
The WHO between lobbying and corruption
In doing so, the German government in particular is ignoring the fact that the WHO is de facto controlled by the pharmaceutical industry and global corporations.
Following the withdrawal of the US, Germany is now the largest donor. It is closely followed by the Gates Foundation and then the international vaccine alliance GAVI. Their donations are mostly earmarked for specific purposes, such as vaccination campaigns or vaccine development. Ultimately, what private donors pay to the WHO flows back to the donors.
The WHO even officially promises its private donors a “return on investment” of at least 1:35 – that is, for every euro invested, at least 35 euros in profit is promised. Former BSW member of the German Bundestag Andrej Hunko says: “The WHO has been hijacked, that's quite obvious.”
The dubious secretary-general
Fittingly, the WHO chief is even more dubious than his entire organization already is. As Ethiopian health minister, Tedros Ghebreyesus allegedly prevented journalists from reporting on cholera outbreaks. As is often the case with the UN (and all other international associations), this qualified him to become WHO Secretary-General in 2017 with massive support from China.
The African politician then returned the favor in 2020 by withholding information about human-to-human transmission of COVID-19 at the urging of Chinese President Xi Jinping. Of course, he denies this. Instead, he praises China's actions and the alleged openness of the leadership in Beijing, leaving obvious Chinese propaganda messages uncommented. Countless times, calls have been made for his resignation, but with China behind him, he is firmly in the saddle.
In future, this man will be able to declare a “pandemic emergency” entirely on his own, thereby putting restrictions on fundamental rights in Germany on track.
War on freedom of expression
The new IGT also obliges Germany to combat “infodemics.” The term reveals itself: it explains dissenting opinions about the disease. Consequently, the IGT calls for its eradication.
The IGT obliges WHO member states to build “national core capacities to combat misinformation and disinformation.”
What “misinformation and disinformation” is is not defined anywhere. It is therefore entirely at the discretion of the WHO. As a result, truth no longer arises from productive scientific, social, and political discussion.
In the future, truth will only be the result of an administrative act.
And, as we all know, an administration never makes mistakes. It treats its critics accordingly: opponents of coronavirus policy have been criminalized, warnings about the side effects of vaccination have been dismissed, and skeptical voices questioning the official version of the virus's origin have been ridiculed. They have all been defamed, deleted, censored—and in many cases even imprisoned.
But many of yesterday's conspiracy theories are today's truths.
That is why the IGV is a dramatic threat to our society: because it justifies a deeply authoritarian system – with platform rules instead of fundamental rights and a Ministry of Truth instead of democratic debate.
A country that views criticism as a disruptive factor and dissent as a threat is totalitarian. Friedrich Merz is turning Germany into just such a country.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
