WHO's special programmes: undermining from above.

Despite the World Health Organisation's spoken commitment to developing integrated primary health care, its most visible and successful activities are not integrated within countries; they are its disease specific intervention programmes, such as the Global Programme on AIDS and the programmes for the control of diarrhoeal and acute respiratory diseases. The 10 or so special programmes, all but one of which (the onchocerciasis control programme) are based in Geneva, have found increasing favour among donors, but critics say that they undermine WHO's attempts to integrate its activities at country level and discourage countries from developing their own capacity.