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ROME — In a significant announcement, Cindy McCain, the Executive Director of the U.N. World Food Program, revealed her decision to resign from her position in three months to prioritize her health. The announcement, made on Thursday, has sent ripples through the humanitarian community.
McCain, who is 71 and hails from the United States, encountered a mild stroke in October 2025. Demonstrating remarkable resilience, she returned to the World Food Program’s headquarters in Rome early January, ready to take on her responsibilities once more.
The World Food Program acknowledged her swift return to leadership, emphasizing her dedication to managing the organization’s efforts against the numerous hunger crises worldwide. However, the organization noted that the job’s intense demands were beginning to surpass her recovery pace.
“With a heavy heart, I am announcing my intention to step down as the executive director of the World Food Program,” McCain expressed. “Serving this incredible organization has been the honor of a lifetime.”
In her statement, McCain highlighted the World Food Program’s critical role in saving lives, emphasizing their work in the most dangerous, impoverished, and remote areas of the world—places where their presence is most crucial.
She added she had hoped to finish her term and the decision to leave the organization was “one of the most difficult decisions I have ever had to make.
”But my health has not recovered to a level that allows me to fully serve the enormous demands of this job,” she said.
McCain stressed that “over the past three years, we have delivered life-saving and life-changing assistance for millions of the world’s most vulnerable people — and this unwavering commitment will be more important than ever in the years to come.”
McCain was appointed in March 2023 to lead the world’s largest humanitarian organization for a five-year term. She had previously served as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. agencies for food and agriculture under former President Joe Biden.
The widow of Republican Sen. John McCain, she broke with Republicans when she endorsed Biden for president in 2020, making her a key surrogate for the Democrat after now-President Donald Trump spent years criticizing her husband and his military service.
She has since become the face of the World Food Program, one of the few U.N. agencies that has received bipartisan support for its efforts to help nearly 150 million people confronting conflicts, disasters and impacts of climate change this year.
McCain and the WFP have been in the spotlight as the agency has sought to respond to the humanitarian crises caused by the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine and Israel’s offensive inside the Gaza Strip.
McCain had succeeded David Beasley, a former South Carolina governor who had led WFP through challenging times, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the global food crisis sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.