I like to Go. To. The. Source.
International Code Documentation Centre and International Baby Food Action
Network are the world's experts on the Coe, its implementation, and
advocacy efforts. Here is a link to their June 2018 article, of the
activity occurring at the World Health Assembly meeting in May 2018,
intended to gut a pro-BFg, pro- BFg-in-emergencies, pro-Code Resolution.
Links to the various documents are contained within.
The World Health Assembly (WHA, the governing body of the World Health
Organization) prefers to operate by **consensus.** That means that there
is intensive background work done ahead of time, to get the countries
agreed on various resolutions that will be addressed at the bi-annual
meeting. That way the resolutions are presented to the WHA as a consensus
resolution, a voice vote passes the measure, and a roll-call vote is not
required. And the on-the-spot discussion, arm-twisting, persuasion, and
huddling brings whole new meaning to the word "lobbying." It is FIERCE and
INTENSE.
You are not going to find a smoking gun wherein the USA government issues a
publicly-available memo to the WHA delegation that says "Bon voyage! Please
make sure you bully-up a few countries, threaten trade retaliation, all at
the last minute." But the article from ICDC/IBFAN offers enough of a paper
trail to lend credibility to the viral New York Times story. If you are on
Twitter, take a look at the flurry of activity on May 24 & 25 under the
hashtags #holdtheline, #WHA17, #WHA designed to put the brakes on the
nefarious USA actions.
Interesting factoid: the Code when passed in 1981 was forced into a roll
call vote -- requiring the USA to be on the record as the sole country
*against* it. Two other countries initially voted "no" but the political
activity was so intense they thought their vote was on a motion to close
debate, not on the measure itself. From The Code Handbook 2d ed, Sokol, 2005
https://www.ibfan-icdc.org/scrutinisng-the-2018-wha-resolution-on-iycf-how-to-salvage/
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