The WHO denies any complacency towards China.
Geneva, Switzerland:
The World Well being Group has up to date its account of the early phases of the COVID disaster to say it was alerted by its personal workplace in China, and never by China itself, to the primary pneumonia instances in Wuhan.
The UN well being physique has been accused by US President Donald Trump of failing to offer the knowledge wanted to stem the pandemic and of being complacent in the direction of Beijing, costs it denies.
On April 9, WHO printed an preliminary timeline of its communications, partly in response to criticism of its early response to the outbreak that has now claimed greater than 521,000 lives worldwide.
In that chronology, WHO had stated solely that the Wuhan municipal well being fee within the province of Hubei had on December 31 reported instances of pneumonia. The UN well being company didn’t nonetheless specify who had notified it.
WHO director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus instructed a press convention on April 20 the primary report had come from China, with out specifying whether or not the report had been despatched by Chinese language authorities or one other supply.
However a brand new chronology, printed this week by the Geneva-based establishment, provides a extra detailed model of occasions.
It signifies that it was the WHO workplace in China that on December 31 notified its regional level of contact of a case of “viral pneumonia” after having discovered a declaration for the media on a Wuhan well being fee web site on the difficulty.
The identical day, WHO’s epidemic data service picked up one other information report transmitted by the worldwide epidemiological surveillance community ProMed — primarily based in america — about the identical group of instances of pneumonia from unknown causes in Wuhan.
After which, WHO requested the Chinese language authorities on two events, on January 1 and January 2, for details about these instances, which they offered on January three.
WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan instructed a press convention on Friday that international locations have 24-48 hours to formally confirm an occasion and supply the company with extra details about the character or explanation for an occasion.
Ryan added that the Chinese language authorities instantly contacted WHO’s as quickly because the company requested to confirm the report.
US President Donald Trump has introduced that his nation, the principle monetary contributor to WHO, will reduce its bridges with the establishment, which he accuses of being too near China and of getting poorly managed the pandemic.
The WHO denies any complacency towards China.
(Aside from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is printed from a syndicated feed.)
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