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The WHO's role in the ongoing Coronavirus Pandemic

MenInG

MenInG

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President Trump has said he will suspend US funding of the World Health Organization (WHO) while a review takes place into what he called the "severe mismanagement" of the crisis.

The new coronavirus - as we now know it - was reported to the WHO on 31 December. Here's a quick timeline of selected WHO action in the following month:


The new coronavirus - as we now know it - was reported to the WHO on 31 December. Here's a quick timeline of selected WHO action in the following month:

4 January: Notes the outbreak on social media for the first time, referring to it as a "cluster of pneumonia cases"

5 January: Publishes first outbreak news, with "no evidence of significant human-to-human transmission"

10 January: Publishes first travel advice, with "no international restrictions recommended"

14 January: WHO's technical lead for the response says there may have been limited human-to-human transmission

20-21 January: WHO regional experts "conduct a brief field visit to Wuhan"

22 January: Field visit statement "suggests that human-to-human transmission is taking place in Wuhan"

22-23 January: WHO emergency committee fails to reach consensus on "whether the outbreak constituted a public health emergency of international concern"

24 January: Second travel advice published, which notes upcoming Chinese New Year but "advises against the application of any restrictions of international traffic"

27 January: Third travel advice published, which advises "measures to limit the risk of exportation...without unnecessary restrictions of international traffic"

28 January: Senior WHO delegation led by the director general meets Chinese leadership in Beijing

30 January: Emergency committee reconvenes and declares public health emergency of international concern
 
Now that you have put it in points and date , it sounds even worse!
 
Who funds the WHO?

The WHO is funded by member states (there are 194, plus two associate members) and outside donations.

The "membership fees" (known as "assessed contributions") are calculated relative to wealth and population.

So for 2020/21, Afghanistan's membership fee is $33,500 - 0.007% of the membership fee total. The United States' is $116m - 22% of the membership fee total.

However, the "assessed contributions" make up less than a quarter of WHO funding. Voluntary donations, from countries and other groups, make up the rest.

This chart from the WHO shows its revenue for 2018/19. By providing $400m, the US was by far the biggest contributor, followed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK.

The United States' $400m represents just under 15% of the total WHO "programme budget" for 2018/19.

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As we mentioned earlier, the chief of the United Nations has criticised US President Donald Trump for wanting to cut funding to the World Health Organization, saying now was "not the time" to reduce resources for the WHO.

"Now is the time for unity and for the international community to work together in solidarity to stop this virus and its shattering consequences," UN Secretary General António Guterres said.

Trump had earlier accused the WHO of "severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus" and said the US would halt funding pending a review of the situation.

Guterres however stressed the WHO was "on the front lines, supporting member states and their societies, especially the most vulnerable among them, with guidance, training, equipment and concrete life-saving services”.

“It is my belief that the World Health Organization must be supported, as it is absolutely critical to the world’s efforts to win the war against Covid-19.”
 
Trump is seeking to cast blame to distract from his gross failures as President.
 
nothing but a political stunt. this contribution to WHO will be restored in a few days or weeks and it will be done so quietly that in the US his voters will never find out and yet they will all be orgasmic about how trump is bullying around UN and WHO.. organizations his voters love to hate.
 
Robert said:
Trump is seeking to cast blame to distract from his gross failures as President.
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True, but that doesn’t discount the fact that WHO has been a monumental failure in managing the crisis -

1. Taiwan warned WHO about a Sars-like virus & also about possible human to human transmission in late Dec, WHO chose to ignore those emails.

2. Even when it was increasingly becoming clear that closing flights to China was the only solution, WHO advised not to close down flights to China.

3. Delayed announcement of a pandemic which would have validated nations call to ban flights to affected areas.

4. Now, its latest directive doesn’t call for wet markets to be closed in China, only asks for exotic animals not to be traded & sold or something like that. This one is a complete shocker which has even led to Australian PM to term it unbelievable!

5. When US accused WHO of pandering to Chinese interests, the WHO chief in turn played the racial card by accusing the Taiwanese of discriminating against Africans! Does that even make sense?

6. No just US, even countries like Japan, England & Australia are accusing WHO chief of pandering to his Chinese masters!

Don’t forget that WHO was a monumental failure in tackling the Ebola crisis, this one is just as bad.
 
Stewie said:
nothing but a political stunt. this contribution to WHO will be restored in a few days or weeks and it will be done so quietly that in the US his voters will never find out and yet they will all be orgasmic about how trump is bullying around UN and WHO.. organizations his voters love to hate.
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Exactly. He is amping up the theatrics as the elections draw near. His ranting and raving at the daily press briefing the other day was just appalling. But he knows what he is doing and it has nothing to do with saving lives or running the country efficiently.
 
Bill and Melinda Gates slam Trump's WHO decision

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda have said US President Donald Trump's decision to halt funding for the World Health Organization (WHO) is "as dangerous as it sounds".

"The world needs WHO now more than ever," they responded on Twitter.

Their organisation, the Gates Foundation, is one of the WHO's largest donors.
 
MenInG said:
Bill and Melinda Gates slam Trump's WHO decision

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda have said US President Donald Trump's decision to halt funding for the World Health Organization (WHO) is "as dangerous as it sounds".

"The world needs WHO now more than ever," they responded on Twitter.

Their organisation, the Gates Foundation, is one of the WHO's largest donors.
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They are right. WHO like them or not, are essential in fighting the coronavirus. There is no organization who can see this through/coordinate on a global scale. Even if they do a small amount of what they are supposed to do, it will only help. Meanwhile, without them this might turn into an even bigger disaster.
 
We must insist on truth, says US Speaker Pelosi

The Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, has launched a scathing attack on President Donald Trump, hours after he announced the US would halt funding to the World Health Organization (WHO).

"Americans must ignore lies and start to listen to scientists and other respected professionals in order to protect ourselves and our loved ones," she said in a statement.

She said the president "ignored... warnings, took insufficient action and caused unnecessary death and disaster", adding that shortages of tests and protective equipment were threatening lives.

"There are important decisions ahead," she went on to say. "But if we are not working from the truth, more lives will be lost, economic hardship and suffering will be extended unnecessarily and our children will not be safe, happy and learning."
 
Top decision by US. WHO blew this big time and must be held accountable. This virus started spreading in china in November/December. On January 14th, WHO tweeted that there is no evidence of human-to-human transmission based on preliminary investigations. THIS IS CRIMINAL! They did not do due diligence and kept on rejecting travel restrictions all January.

Political stunt or not, this is a good decision by trump. The timing can be questioned but WHO is pretty useless right now.
 
WHO is responsible for mismanagement of covid 19 outbreak. More countries should hold back its funding.

Why should countries fund chinese propoganda?
 
cricketjoshila said:
WHO is responsible for mismanagement of covid 19 outbreak. More countries should hold back its funding.

Why should countries fund chinese propoganda?
Click to expand...

Not right now when they are Atleast doing something for poor countries, but yeah after this tradegy is over, there should be big investigation regarding WHO role specially the current head role, the way he attacked and shifted blame on Taiwan was shameful for a person who is leading WHO
 
US President Donald Trump has instructed his administration to temporarily halt funding to the World Health Organization (WHO) over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Trump said the WHO "failed in its basic duty and it must be held accountable". He said it promoted China's "disinformation" about the virus that likely led to a wider outbreak.

The United States is the biggest overall donor to the Geneva-based WHO, contributing more than $400m in 2019, roughly 15 percent of its budget.

Reaction to Trump's move was fast and furious worldwide.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres

This is "not the time" to reduce resources for WHO operations, Guterres said.

"Now is the time for unity and for the international community to work together in solidarity to stop this virus and its shattering consequences," he said.

Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security

"The move sends the wrong message during the middle of a pandemic, said Dr Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease expert and senior scholar at the centre.

Adalja said the WHO does make mistakes, as it did in delaying the response to the Ebola outbreak in 2013 and 2014 in West Africa. He said reforms might be needed, but that work needs to take place after the pandemic has passed.

"It's not the middle of a pandemic that you do this type of thing," he said.

Adalja said the WHO collects information about where the virus is active in every county in the world, which the United States needs to help guide decisions about when to open borders.

US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Directed requests for comment to the White House.

American Medical Association

AMA President Patrice Harris called it "a dangerous step in the wrong direction that will not make defeating COVID-19 easier" and urged Trump to reconsider.

Protect Our Care

"This is nothing more than a transparent attempt by President Trump to distract from his history downplaying the severity of the coronavirus crisis and his administration's failure to prepare our nation," said Chair Leslie Dach, who served as the global Ebola coordinator for the US Department of Health and Human Services.

"To be sure, the World Health Organization is not without fault but it is beyond irresponsible to cut its funding at the height of a global pandemic. This move will undoubtedly make Americans less safe."

Vanderbilt University Medical Center

"This virus doesn't need passports. In a few short months it has travelled to all of the continents of the world except Antarctica. If there were ever an event that showed us how we need to work tougher as a global community, this is it," said Dr William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert.

Chairman, US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee

"With each passing day of this worsening crisis, the president is showing us his political playbook: Blame the WHO, blame China, blame his political opponents, blame his predecessors - do whatever it takes to deflect from the fact that his administration mismanaged this crisis and it's now costing thousands of American lives," Democratic representative Eliot Engel.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern

"At a time like this when we need to be sharing information and we need to have advice we can rely on, the WHO has provided that. We will continue to support it and continue to make our contributions," Ardern said.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison

Morrison said he sympathised with Trump's criticisms of the WHO, especially its support of reopening China's "wet markets" where freshly slaughtered animals are sold and where the outbreak first appeared in the city of Wuhan late last year.

"But that said, the WHO also as an organisation does a lot of important work including here in our region in the Pacific and we work closely with them," Morrison said.

"We are not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater here, but they are also not immune from criticism and immune from doing things better."

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/04/world-reacts-trump-withdrawing-funding-200415061612025.html
 
As If USA follow or need guidelines from WHO.

WHO is ceremonial organization. Every developed country follow guidelines from its own Medical Body in preference to WHO.

WHO never had the authority. Trump and his predecessors should have played the role to empower WHO in true sense. Ridiculous to blame WHO for your own incompetence.
 
BEIJING (Reuters) - China urged the United States on Wednesday to fulfill its obligations to the World Health Organization (WHO), after U.S. President Donald Trump halted funding to the body over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters during a daily briefing the situation with the pandemic, which has infected nearly 2 million people globally, was at a critical stage and that the U.S.’s decision would affect all countries of the world.
 
WHO should be held accountable for the debacle of the way they handled information.

Had WHO been accurate, then the lockdown may have come early, but no, not only did WHO claim C19 was 'Flu' like but also claimed human-to-human was not possible.

Instead the liberal left blame the leaders, and even accuse Trump and Boris for being both xenophobic and racist when banning flights to and from China.

You can't win with the left.
 
Analysis: Trump's move a major blow to WHO
Tulip Mazumdar

Global Health Correspondent

President Trump's decision is a major blow to the World Health Organization (WHO). The US is the biggest contributor to the UN agency, where the budget is around $2bn (£1.6bn) a year.

The president, while himself facing withering criticism for his handling of the outbreak in the US, is focussing his anger on how the WHO handled the early days and weeks of the outbreak.

He is not the first to criticise the UN agency for its effusive praise of China's response to the outbreak, while others - including medics in China - described how their early concerns about the virus were silenced by authorities.

The director general of the WHO, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has responded to this criticism many times, saying he would continue to give praise where praise was due, and stressing that China had helped slow the spread of the virus internationally - buying other countries time to prepare for what was coming.

Last week, when President Trump floated the idea of withholding funding to the UN body, Dr Tedros called for countries not to "politicise this virus.". He also said he welcomed a review of the WHO's response to the outbreak because "we want to learn from our mistakes, from our strengths and move forward".

But he said, the focus now should be on "fighting this virus."
 
WHO has a whole history of goof ups

Its about time someone took them to task,

btw. it seems they have been compromised by the Chinese.
 
WHO chief 'regrets' Trump halting funding

In the past few minutes the World Health Organization's chief, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has been speaking about US President Donald Trump's decision to halt funding for the organisation.

He said the WHO regretted the move, but added: "Our commitment to public health, science, and to serving all the people of the world without fear or favour remains absolute."

Dr Tedros said the agency was "reviewing" the impact of the withdrawal of US funds to "ensure our work continues uninterpreted".
 
The facts regarding Taiwan’s email to alert WHO to possible danger of COVID-19

In response to WHO’s denial that Taiwan ever alerted it to the possibility of human-to-human transmission of COVID-19, the Central Epidemic Command Center makes the following statement today, April 11:

1. The Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) learned from online sources that there had been at least seven cases of atypical pneumonia in Wuhan, China. In China, the term “atypical pneumonia” is commonly used to refer to SARS, a disease transmitted between humans caused by coronavirus.

2. Owing to its experience with the SARS epidemic in 2003, Taiwan vigilantly kept track of information about the new outbreak. On December 31, 2019, Taiwan sent an email to the International Health Regulations (IHR) focal point under the World Health Organization (WHO), informing WHO of its understanding of the disease and also requesting further information from WHO. Given the lack of clarity at the time, as well as the many rumors that were circulating, Taiwan’s aim was to ensure that all relevant parties remained alert, especially since the outbreak occurred just before the Lunar New Year holiday, which typically sees tremendous amounts of travel. To be prudent, in the email we took pains to refer to atypical pneumonia, and specifically noted that patients had been isolated for treatment. Public health professionals could discern from this wording that there was a real possibility of human-to-human transmission of the disease. However, because at the time there were as yet no cases of the disease in Taiwan, we could not state directly and conclusively that there had been human-to-human transmission.

3. The Taiwan CDC also contacted the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention in a bid to obtain more information. However, in response to our inquiries, the WHO IHR focal point only responded with a short message stating that Taiwan’s information had been forwarded to expert colleagues; China provided only a press release.

4. Even though Taiwan strongly suspected that human-to-human transmission of the disease was already occurring at the time, we were unable to gain confirmation through existing channels. Therefore, on the day the aforementioned email was sent to WHO, the Taiwan government activated enhanced border control and quarantine measures based on the assumption that human-to-human transmission was in fact occurring. These measures included screening passengers on flights from Wuhan prior to disembarkation.

5. In mid-January, the Taiwan CDC dispatched experts to Wuhan to gain a better understanding of the epidemic, the control measures taken there, and patients’ exposure history. Based on preliminary research, Taiwan determined that this form of pneumonia could indeed spread via human-to-human transmission.

https://www.cdc.gov.tw/En/Bulletin/Detail/PAD-lbwDHeN_bLa-viBOuw?typeid=158
 
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WHO ‘regrets’ Trump’s decision to withhold funding, says focus is on saving lives in coronavirus pandemic

The World Health Organization is turning to other countries to help fill any gaps in financing its Covid-19 response work after U.S. President Donald Trump said the United States would withhold contributions.

“The United States of America has been a long-standing and generous friend to the WHO and we hope it will continue to be so,” WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference on Wednesday. “We regret the decision of the President of the United States to order a hold in funding to the World Health Organization.”

Trump announced Tuesday that the U.S. will suspend funding to WHO while it reviews the agency’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic. He said the administration will conduct a “thorough” investigation that should last 60 to 90 days.

Trump criticized the international agency’s response to the outbreak at a White House press conference, saying “one of the most dangerous and costly decisions from the WHO was its disastrous decision to oppose travel restrictions from China and other nations” that Trump imposed early on in the outbreak.

In the fiscal year 2019, the U.S. provided about $237 million as well as an additional $656 million in voluntary contributions to the agency, according to a WHO spokesperson, representing about 14.67% of its total budget.

It’s unclear exactly what mechanism Trump intends to use to withhold WHO funding, much of which is appropriated by Congress. The president typically does not have the authority to unilaterally redirect congressional funding.

While details of the plan are still unavailable, CNBC’s Eamon Javers reported Wednesday that the administration intends to rely on a novel interpretation of the law governing the president’s ability to redirect congressionally mandated funds.

According to administration officials, they intend to argue that Congress funded the WHO under a broad umbrella of “global aid” funds, and as a result, they will claim that the president has the right to redirect the WHO funds to any “global aid” program in the same category as the WHO.

This is unlikely to be an effective argument for congressional appropriators, who closely guard the legislative branch’s “power of the purse.”

In a statement Wednesday, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called Trump’s decision “dangerous, illegal and will be swiftly challenged.”

“The president’s halting of funding to the WHO as it leads the global fight against the coronavirus pandemic is senseless,” she said. “We can only be successful in defeating this global pandemic through a coordinated international response with respect for science and data.”

The American Nurses Association is also urging Trump to reconsider his decision.

“The decision to discontinue the United States funding for the World Health Organization at this time of the pandemic is misguided and will hinder global efforts to battle the coronavirus,” ANA President Ernest Grant said in a statement. “International cooperation among governments and the scientific and health care communities is essential to halt the spread of the disease and share tools, strategies and solutions to mitigate its impact.”

Tedros said Wednesday that the agency’s mission is to work with all nationals “equally” without regard to their populations or economy. He said the agency’s performance in handling the pandemic will be reviewed by member states to ensure “full transparency and accountability.”

“For that matter, involving all responders, this is part of the usual process put in place by our member states,” he said. “No doubt areas for improvement will be identified and there will be lessons for all of us to learn, but for now our focus, my focus, is on stoping this virus and saving lives.”

Tedros, who has said he has received death threats and insults, said WHO is not only fighting the coronavirus, adding the agency is working to address “polio, measles, malaria, ebola, HIV, TB, malnutrition, cancer, diabetes, mental health and many other diseases.”

“This is a time for all of us to be united in our common struggle against a common threat, a dangerous enemy,” he said.

The coronavirus, which emerged in Wuhan, China over three months ago, has infected 2 million people worldwide and killed at least 128,886 as of Wednesday, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

WHO started sounding the alarm on the outbreak of a new coronavirus in China, in mid-January, designating the now Covid-19 pandemic as a global health emergency on Jan. 30 when there were just 8,200 cases in 18 countries across the world.

The WHO’s global emergency declaration on Jan. 30 was nearly a month before Trump tweeted that “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA” and six weeks before he declared a national emergency on March 13.

Two days earlier, on March 11, WHO officials declared the outbreak a pandemic, when there were just 121,000 global cases.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/15/who...-on-saving-lives-in-coronavirus-pandemic.html
 
Gates ups pandemic funds to $250 million, says Trump WHO move makes 'no sense'

Pulling funding from the World Health Organization (WHO) is a dangerous and nonsensical move when the world is facing the health crisis brought by the COVID-19 disease pandemic, Melinda Gates said on Wednesday.

Announcing an extra $150 million of funding from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to help speed the development of treatments, vaccines and public health measures to tackle the new coronavirus outbreak, Melinda Gates said the WHO was “exactly the organization that can deal with this pandemic”.

“De-funding the WHO makes absolutely no sense during a pandemic. We need a global coordinated response,” Gates, who co-chairs the foundation with the billionaire Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, said in a telephone interview.

“When you’re in a crisis like this, it’s all hands on deck.”

President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday a halt in U.S. funding to the WHO, saying it had “failed in its basic duty” in allowing the pandemic to take hold.

The Gates Foundation is the second largest donor to the WHO behind the United States. Melinda Gates said earlier that cutting WHO funding in a health crisis was “as dangerous as it sounds”.

The WHO’s Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday he regretted Trump’s decision. He said the organization was still assessing the impact and would “try to fill any gaps with partners”.

The philanthropic Gates Foundation’s new $150 million commitment brings its COVID-19 funding for the international response to date to $250 million, but Gates said any gap left in the WHO’s funding would be very hard for others to fill.

Alongside support for new diagnostics, drugs and vaccines, the Gates money is primarily aimed at helping poorer countries and vulnerable populations handle the oncoming and spreading pandemic and the poverty it will cause.

“We really as a global community need to address what is now just beginning in African and South Asian countries. We see a huge need, and that’s why we have more than doubled our commitment,” she said.

Praising what she described as “heroic work” by local leaders and healthcare workers in poorer countries seeking to protect vulnerable communities and slow the spread of COVID-19, Melinda Gates said the world’s response to the pandemic “will not be effective unless it is also equitable”.

“Whenever a health crisis hits like this, it’s the people on the margins that it hits the very most,” she said. “They’re the ones we need to help to ensure things like cash transfer payments are made and they have access to primary healthcare.”

There are currently no effective vaccines, drugs or other immune system treatments approved to treat COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.

The $150 million of extra funding adds to an initial $100 million from the Gates Foundation designed to kick-start scientific and public health projects.

Gates said the Foundation is backing eight projects seeking potential solutions for COVID-19 vaccine development and has co-funded enhanced virus detection capacity in Africa as well as contributing to the response in China.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...s-trump-who-move-makes-no-sense-idUSKCN21X3FK
 
The WHO has been criminally incompetent from the very beginning. I fully support Trump for this withdrawal, not that it excuses Trump for his own failure to act quickly.

1. Playing down the risk of human-to-human transmissions in the beginning
2. Playing down the risk of a pandemic in January, stating that it's a localized infection
3. Failure to declare a pandemic by the end of January
4. Refusal to heed the warnings from Taiwan
5. Most criminally, constantly giving out misleading guidance about how masks are not effective to contain the spread

Should be made defunct as soon as possible.
 
How much $$$ will the world save if the entire United Nations is gotten rid of?
 
Any sane person will know that WHO has been woefully incompetent in this scenario. We have been discussing this in other threads

The only ones who deny are just politically motivated or just plain stupid.
For example trump haters will go with WHO just for the sake of it
 
I guess it’s still very much wrong to stop funding to WHO at this juncture in middle of pandemic. But a criminal investigation in international courts should be initiated after we are through this. May be then Usa can either reduce or completely stop funding based on that
 
Other countries should also withold funding. Why should other countries fund chinese propoganda machine?

And how long before the race card is played here?
 
BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s foreign ministry said on Thursday the World Health Organization has said there is no evidence that the coronavirus that has infected more than 2 million people globally was made in a lab.

Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian made the remark in response to a question about accusations the coronavirus originated in a lab in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the epidemic first emerged in late 2019.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...e-coronavirus-was-made-in-a-lab-idUSKCN21Y0U4
 
"Covid-19 anywhere is Covid-19 everywhere," Melinda Gates said as she called for global co-operation to beat the pandemic.

The philanthropist was speaking to Emma Barnett on BBC Radio 5 Live after President Donald Trump announced the US would stop funding the World Health Organization (WHO).

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation - the second-largest funder of the WHO - has pledged a further $150m (£120m) to fight Covid-19, but she said they did not expect a vaccine to be available for 18 months.

Gates also said:

Her family had predicted a pandemic, making preparations including storing food, but had "hoped we would never see it in our lifetime"
When they saw the Wuhan data, she and Bill said - "Oh my gosh, this is actually happening"
"There are no tools, nothing we can do specifically, no drugs or vaccine. It is a disease we are all in together"
The UK has shown leadership by funding research because "the vaccine is the way to go"
De-funding the WHO now makes "no sense".
 
https://theprint.in/opinion/pov/dear-indians-rush-support-trump-who-funding-cut-hurts-us/403786/

Dear Indians, don’t rush to support everything Trump does. WHO funding cut only hurts us.

Beyond the coronavirus pandemic, India is often at the cusp of outbreaks such as encephalitis or measles. A bankrupt WHO will leave India without best global practices.

It is becoming kind of fashionable to criticise the World Health Organization these days. There are many Indians who have joined the US President Donald Trump in calling Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of WHO, an incompetent, shady Chinese proxy in the current coronavirus crisis. But Trump’s decision to cut funding to the WHO will only hurt India.

Criticism of Tedros should be insulated from undermining an organisation like the WHO, which still plays a key role in countries like India.

Currently, India neither has the economic and hard power nor the expertise to drive global outcomes, regardless of how much rhetorical power projection the Narendra Modi government might indulge in. So, the next time Trump thanks you for sending an order of hydroxychloroquine, request him to not cut the WHO’s funding during a pandemic.
 
Dear Indians,

Please ask Trump to not cut off funds from WHO, so next time a virus comes out of China they can warn us months too late and millions can die.

Thank you
 
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GENEVA, April 19 (Xinhua) -- World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Sunday that lifting lockdown restrictions for COVID-19 is not the end of the epidemic, it's just the beginning of the next phase.

Speaking at the Group of 20 (G20) Health Ministers virtual meeting from Geneva, the WHO chief said it's vital in this next phase that countries educate, engage and empower their people to prevent and respond rapidly to any resurgence.

"We are encouraged that several G20 countries are now starting to plan how to ease social restrictions. It is critical that these measures are a phased process," he said.

Tedros told the health ministers that the WHO is deeply concerned that the virus now appears to be gathering pace in countries that lack the capacity of many G20 countries to respond to it.

"Urgent support is needed, not only to support countries to respond to COVID-19, but to ensure other essential health services continue," he said.

Tedros also took the opportunity to thank the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for its support to the global fight against the virus. Saudi Arabia announced Thursday a 500-million-U.S. dollar donation to relevant international organizations to support global efforts in combating the COVID-19.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us of a simple truth: we are one humanity. We share the same planet. We share the same hopes and dreams. We share the same destiny," the WHO chief said.

https://www.thestar.com.my/news/reg...restrictions-is-not-end-of-epidemic-who-chief
 
In an emotional briefing amid rising tensions with the US, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus insisted his agency had not withheld information about the coronavirus from any nation.

The WHO's handling of the pandemic has been criticised by US President Donald Trump, who suspended funding to the UN's global health body last week, saying it had failed to manage the outbreak properly and been too trusting of China.

At the televised briefing, Dr Tedros said about 15 representatives of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had been seconded to the WHO since January and had been kept informed as the situation developed.

"We don't have secrets in WHO, and as soon as we get information we pass it on - because it's about lives," Dr Tedros told the news conference.

He then warned that political disagreements could hamper efforts to save lives.

"You know where I come from - I know war. I know poverty. I know disease. I know how people suffer in all conditions. I know how people are killed because of poverty," Dr Tedros, who is Ethiopian, said.

"Maybe people who don't know all this... maybe they've had an easy ride in life. Maybe they don't know what war means, what poverty means. That's why I'm emotional."
 
Reminds me of a dialogue from GOW for WHO chief:

Ab to sach bolde ..!
 
Suburban NYC county residents sue WHO over virus pandemic response

Residents of a suburban New York City county that was one of the earliest US hot spots for the coronavirus have sued the World Health Organisation, accusing it of gross negligence in covering up and responding to the Covid-19 pandemic.

In a proposed class action, three residents of Westchester County accused the WHO of failing to timely declare a pandemic, monitor China's response to the original outbreak, provide treatment guidelines, advise members on how to respond including through travel restrictions, and coordinate a global response.

They also accused the WHO of conspiring with China's government, which was not named as a defendant, to cover up Covid-19's severity.
 
When things are bad, we all look for a scapegoat. If we have someone to blame, it makes us feel that we know why the negative thing happened and it gives us someone to direct our anger towards other than ourselves.

It's like when northerns in this country can't get jobs and, instead of looking at the dire state of the northern economy and lack of opportunity, they blame foreigners and vote for Brexit.

In the same way, we are all feeling a bit helpless right now and it helps us to blame someone - the WHO.

What everyone forgets is that national governments across the world have their own top scientists yet virtually no country realised quite the scale of what was about to happen. America, the supposed superpower of the world, was completed blindsided. Are you really telling me that's the fault of the WHO?

The reality is very simple. We've had many viruses before, from SARS to Ebola to Swine Flu. None have been remotely in the same league as this virus when it comes to worldwide spread. So when this new Cornavirus came along, it was assumed by almost every government in the world that this was the new SARS at worst.

The Chinese lockdown was visible to scientists in every western country on earth - none of the scientific advisory bodies to these governments screamed and shouted that the WHO advice is wrong.

I am not saying that the WHO are not at fault - I'm saying I don't know enough to pass judgment on it. It's easy to say with hindsight that the WHO ought to have seen this coming. In reality however, it clearly was not as easy to predict as people are making out.
 
As many countries seek an end, or partial end to their lockdowns, the World Health Organization has once again given a warning that this should be a gradual process.

Premature relaxations may lead to a surge of new Covid-19 infections, the organisation said on Tuesday.

"At least until a vaccine, or a very effective treatment, is found, this process will need to become our new normal," Takeshi Kasai, Regional Director for the Western Pacific said, adding that lockdown measures have proved effective.

Any governments that are thinking of easing measures should plan to do it in stages while continuously monitoring the situation, he added.

"Individuals and society need to be ready for a new way ofliving," he said.

Countries like Japan and Singapore have seen recent surges in new infections, prompting concerns over a second wave of Covid-19 cases.
 
Coronavirus very likely of animal origin, no sign of lab manipulation - WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday that all available evidence suggests that the novel coronavirus originated in bats in China late last year and it was not manipulated or constructed in a laboratory.
 
WHO did downplay the extent of this disease but they play a very important role in a lot of poor countries especially Africa. Considering Africa is going to be the next epicentre of COVID-19, it’s inhuman to halt their funds now. There needs to be a collective effort somewhere, no country can stand by it’s own.
 
BEIJING (Reuters) - The World Health Organization warned on Tuesday that any lifting of lockdowns to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus must be gradual, and if restrictions were to be relaxed too soon, there would be a resurgence of infections.

Lockdown measures have proved effective, and people must be ready for a new way of living to allow society to function while the coronavirus is being kept in check, said Takeshi Kasai, WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific.

We must adapt our lives and health systems along with the epidemic, Kasai told an online press conference.

“At least until a vaccine, or a very effective treatment, is found, this process will need to become our new normal.”

Governments considering lifting lockdown measures should do so carefully and in stages, and continue to monitor the epidemic situation, he said. So long as the coronavirus is circulating, no country is safe from a potentially overwhelming outbreak, he said.

“Individuals and society need to be ready for a new way of living,” he said.

While the Western Pacific has in recent weeks been much less hard hit by the epidemic than the United States or Europe, there has been an increase in cases in Japan and Singapore, among other countries.

Kasai also warned that the epidemic must not disrupt vaccination programmes against other diseases like polio, measles and rubella. Otherwise the Western Pacific could face a new crisis when health systems are already strained, he said.

Source Reuters
 
At the World Health Organization's briefing, its head has warned that although epidemics in Western Europe "appear to be stable or declining", there are still "worrying upward trends in Africa, Central and South America, and Eastern Europe".

"Make no mistake - we have a long way to go, this virus will be with us for a long time," director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

He said that while people are "understandably frustrated" with stay-at-home orders, "one of the greatest dangers we face now is complacency".

"The world will not and cannot go back to the way things were," Dr Tedros added. "There must be a new normal, a world that's healthier, safer and better prepared."
 
At the World Health Organization's briefing, its head has warned that although epidemics in Western Europe "appear to be stable or declining", there are still "worrying upward trends in Africa, Central and South America, and Eastern Europe".

"Make no mistake - we have a long way to go, this virus will be with us for a long time," director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

He said that while people are "understandably frustrated" with stay-at-home orders, "one of the greatest dangers we face now is complacency".

"The world will not and cannot go back to the way things were," Dr Tedros added. "There must be a new normal, a world that's healthier, safer and better prepared."
 
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), has said he believes the group warned the world of Covid-19 early enough.

"Looking back I think we declared the emergency at the right time and when the world had enough time to respond," he said.

He added the WHO issued its warning when there were no deaths and just 82 cases.

"That was enough to cut it from the bud, enough. That was January 30 and this is more than two months and 21 days ago - close to three months now."

Dr Tedros has faced some calls to resign over handling of the Covid-19 crisis, particularly from a number of US lawmakers. But many governments have praised the organisation, saying its work at this time is vital.

When asked about calls for his resignation, Dr Tedros said he would keep working "day and night" to save lives.
 
Apparently WHO, Gates foundation and others for hacked. (25,000+ email ID's).

Conspiracy theories are coming out saying it was all planned?
[MENTION=9]Saj[/MENTION] [MENTION=93712]MenInG[/MENTION] how much truth is there?
 
big_gamer007 said:
Apparently WHO, Gates foundation and others for hacked. (25,000+ email ID's).

Conspiracy theories are coming out saying it was all planned?
[MENTION=9]Saj[/MENTION] [MENTION=93712]MenInG[/MENTION] how much truth is there?
Click to expand...

The virus? Not any. We know for sure how it originated. Virus species jump happens all the time, with only the slightest fraction going to full pandemic scale. This is one of those times and it won't be the last either.
 
Arsal_AK said:
The virus? Not any. We know for sure how it originated. Virus species jump happens all the time, with only the slightest fraction going to full pandemic scale. This is one of those times and it won't be the last either.
Click to expand...

Yea supposedly hackers have leaked E-mails and conspiracy theorists are saying this is planned pandemic, orchestrated by global powers.
 
China pledges $30m more for WHO's coronavirus fight

China said it would donate a further $30 million to the World Health Organisation (WHO), which is seeking more than $1 billion to fund its battle against the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 180,000 people worldwide, Reuters reported.

“At this crucial moment, supporting WHO is supporting multilateralism and global solidarity,” Hua Chunying, a spokeswoman of China's foreign ministry, said on Twitter.
 
Australia says all WHO members should back coronavirus inquiry

All member nations of the World Health Organisation (WHO) should support a proposed independent review into the coronavirus pandemic, Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said, further threatening strained ties with China.

Australia has become one of most forceful critics of Beijing for its handling of the spread of the coronavirus, with Morrison urging several world leaders to support an international inquiry into its origins and spread, as well as the WHO’s response.

Morrison said all members of the WHO should be obliged to participate in a review, adding that Australia would push for the inquiry during the WHO Assembly on May 17.
 
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the COVID-19 pandemic shows the need to overhaul the World Health Organization, warning that Washington may never restore WHO funding and could even work to set up an alternative to the U.N. body instead.

As Pompeo launched fresh attacks on the WHO, Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives accused the Trump administration of trying to “scapegoat” the institution to distract from its own handling of the coronavirus outbreak.

In a letter to President Donald Trump, they called for the immediate restoration of U.S. funding, which Trump suspended last week after accusing the WHO of being “China-centric” and of promoting China’s “disinformation” about the outbreak.

Pompeo told Fox News late on Wednesday there needed to be “a structural fix of the WHO” to correct its “shortcomings.”

Asked if he was urging a change in leadership of the WHO, Pompeo replied: “Even more than that, it may be the case that the United States can never return to underwriting, having U.S. taxpayer dollars go to the WHO.”

In a radio show interview on Thursday, Pompeo was asked if he saw a time when the role of the WHO might be supplanted by another organization. “We’re going to take a look at exactly that issue,” he replied.

“If the institution works and functions, the United States will always lead and be part of it. When it’s not delivering, when in fact it’s failing to get the outcomes that are desired, we’re going to work with partners around the world to deliver a structure, a form, a governance model, that will actually deliver on the intended purposes.”

The WHO has denied the Trump administration’s charges and China insists it has been transparent and open.

The United States has been the biggest overall donor to the WHO, contributing over $400 million in 2019, roughly 15% of its budget. Senior U.S. officials last week told Reuters Washington could redirect these funds to other aid groups.

On Wednesday, Pompeo said the United States “strongly believed” Beijing had failed to report the outbreak in a timely manner, in breach of WHO rules. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus did not use his ability “to go public” when a member state failed to follow those rules, Pompeo added.

“I’m very confident that the Chinese Communist Party will pay a price for what they did here, certainly from the United States. I don’t know exactly what form that will take,” Pompeo said in an interview with Fox News late on Thursday.

“We have to make sure that we don’t have this problem yet again coming from China,” Pompeo said, adding that the United States had been very direct in making its expectations clear to China.

The acting head of the U.S. Agency for International Development said on Wednesday the United States would assess if the WHO was being run properly and look for alternative partners outside the body.

Any threat to definitively end U.S. funding of the global body would likely hinge on Trump succeeding in his bid for re-election in the November presidential vote against the presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

The U.S. Congress controls federal spending, and could pass legislation to guarantee funding for the WHO. However, to become law it would need to garner enough support, including from Trump’s Republicans, not just to pass but to override a likely veto.

According to a Reuters tally, the coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 180,000 people worldwide, including nearly 48,000 in the United States, making it the worst-hit country by official statistics.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...unds-after-cutoff-over-pandemic-idUSKCN2252GR
 
GENEVA/ZURICH (Reuters) - World leaders pledged on Friday to accelerate work on tests, drugs and vaccines against COVID-19 and to share them around the globe, but the United States did not take part in the launch of the World Health Organization (WHO) initiative.

French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa were among those who joined a video conference to launch what the WHO had billed as a “landmark collaboration” to fight the pandemic.

The aim is to speed development of safe and effective drugs, tests and vaccines to prevent, diagnose and treat COVID-19, the lung disease caused be the novel coronavirus - and ensure equal access to treatments for rich and poor.

“We are facing a common threat which we can only defeat with a common approach,” WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said as the virtual meeting got under way.

“Experience has told us that even when tools are available they have not been equally available to all. We cannot allow that to happen.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the objective at a global pledging effort in early May would be to raise 7.5 billion euros ($8.10 billion) to ramp up work on prevention, diagnostics and treatment.

“This is a first step only, but more will be needed in the future,” von der Leyen told the conference.

Macron said: “We will continue now to mobilise all G7 and G20 countries so they get behind this initiative. And I hope we’ll manage to reconcile around this joint initiative both China and the U.S., because this is about saying: the fight against COVID-19 is a common human good and there should be no division in order to win this battle.”

Ramaphosa, chairman of the African Union, warned that the continent - with its generally poor standards of health care - was “extremely vulnerable to the ravages of this virus and is in need of support”.

Leaders from Asia, the Middle East and the Americas also joined the videoconference, but a spokesman for the U.S. mission in Geneva had earlier told Reuters that the United States would not be involved.

“There will be no U.S. official participation,” he said in an email reply to a query. “We look forward to learning more about this initiative in support of international cooperation to develop a vaccine for COVID-19 as soon as possible.”

U.S. President Donald Trump has lambasted the WHO as being slow to react to the outbreak and being “China-centric” and announced a suspension of funding.

Tedros has steadfastly defended the WHO’s handling of the pandemic and repeatedly committed to conducting a post-pandemic evaluation, as the agency does with all crises.

More than 2.7 million people have been infected with COVID-19 and nearly 190,000 have died from it since the new coronavirus emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, according to a Reuters tally.

More than 100 potential COVID-19 vaccines are being developed, including six already in clinical trials, said Dr. Seth Berkley, CEO of the GAVI vaccine alliance, a public-private partnership that leads immunisation campaigns in poor countries.

“We need to ensure that there are enough vaccines for everyone, we are going to need global leadership to identify and prioritise vaccine candidates,” he told a separate Geneva news briefing before taking part in the formal WHO announcement.

Global manufacturing capacity must be ramped up ahead of choosing “a winner” vaccine, Berkley said, noting that GAVI and the World Bank were looking at the issue.

Slideshow (4 Images)
“We can’t have a repeat of what happened in 2009 - the H1N1 vaccine, when there was not enough supply for developing countries or when supply did come it came much later.”

Another important question was how well a vaccine would work in people most at risk from COVID-19, Berkley said.

“How well do they work in the elderly, are they single or multiple dose etc?” he said, noting that older people had weaker immune systems.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...-curb-covid-19-u-s-not-involved-idUSKCN2261M7
 
No evidence' you can't get Covid-19 twice, says WHO

The World Health Organization said on Saturday there was currently “no evidence” that people who have recovered from coronavirus are protected from a second infection – even if they now have antibodies against it.

In a statement, the UN health agency warned against issuing “immunity passports” or “risk-free certificates” to people who have been infected, saying the practice may actually increase the risk of spread as they may ignore standard advice.

It also warned that the accuracy and reliability of tests for antibodies to coronavirus were not certain.

“Inaccurate immunodiagnostic tests may falsely categorise people in two ways,” the WHO’s latest scientific brief said. “The first is that they may falsely label people who have been infected as negative, and the second is that people who have not been infected are falsely labelled as positive. Both errors have serious consequences and will affect control efforts.”

Chile said last week it would begin handing out “health passports” to people deemed to have recovered from the illness, Reuters reports. Once screened to determine if they have developed antibodies to make them immune to the virus, they could immediately rejoin the workforce.

But, the WHO said: “At this point in the pandemic, there is not enough evidence about the effectiveness of antibody-mediated immunity to guarantee the accuracy of an ‘immunity passport’ or ‘risk-free certificate’. People who assume that they are immune to a second infection because they have received a positive test result may ignore public health advice. The use of such certificates may therefore increase the risks of continued transmission.”
 
WHO clarifies 'immunity passport' advice

The World Health Organization (WHO) has sought to clarify the advice it published on Saturday about so-called “immunity passports”, which could be issued to people who have recovered from Covid-19 on the assumption that they would be immune to reinfection.

The WHO alarmed some in the scientific community when it said, in a briefing note published on Saturday, that “there is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from Covid-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection”.

Experts said the WHO should have said there was “currently insufficient evidence” instead of “no evidence”.

Late last night, the Geneva-based body walked back its statement, saying: “We expect that most people who are infected with #COVID19 will develop an antibody response that will provide some level of protection.”
 
This organisation needs to be held responsible for its role in the spread of the virus.

They made the world aware very late about how deadly the virus is and the fact that it passes from human to human.

Trump was right in stopping this incompetent organisations funding. After this crisis is over, we need to make a new, competent global organisation that can monitor things more effectively.
 
The US House of Representatives foreign affairs committee has launched an investigation into Donald Trump’s decision to block World Health Organization funding, giving the Department of State a week to provide relevant information.

Writing to the to secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, the committee’s chairman said he would support reform of the “imperfect” UN health agency, but cutting its funding “while the world confronts the Covid-19 tragedy is not the answer”.

In the letter, the Democratic representative Eliot Engel asked the State Department to provide 11 sets of documents or other information related to the decision to withhold funding no later than 4 May.

If it did not do so, Engel said the committee would consider all measures at its disposal. A spokesman declined to provide specifics. Engel has the authority as a committee chairman to issue subpoenas to federal agencies.

The requested materials included a list of interagency meetings between 1 December and 14 April at which funding for the WHO was discussed, a list of legal authorities under which the administration will execute the suspension of funds and documents related to the administration’s investigation of the WHO.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump suspended US contributions to the WHO on 14 April, accusing it of being “China-centric” and promoting China’s “disinformation” about the coronavirus outbreak and saying his administration would launch a review of the organisation.

WHO officials have denied the claims and China insists it has been transparent and open. The United States is the WHO’s biggest donor.

Trump’s decision prompted immediate criticism from US allies abroad, and within the United States, from health experts and Democrats.

Some Democrats accused the Republican president of using the WHO and China as scapegoats to distract from what they view as Trump’s mishandling of a pandemic that has killed nearly 55,000 Americans and cratered the economy.

But Trump’s fellow Republicans have largely backed the president, praising his handling of the health crisis and calling on WHO director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, to resign.
 
COVID-19 complication seen in children is 'rare', WHO says

The “vast majority” of children with COVID-19 have mild cases and recover completely, but a small number in a few countries have developed a rare inflammatory syndrome, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday.

Italian and British medical experts are investigating a possible link between the coronavirus pandemic and clusters of severe inflammatory disease in infants who are arriving in hospital with high fever and swollen arteries.

Three U.S. children infected with the virus are being treated for a rare inflammatory syndrome that appears similar to one that has raised concerns in Britain, Italy and Spain, a specialist treating them told Reuters on Tuesday.

“I want to emphasise, for all the parents out there, the vast, vast majority of children who get COVID will have mild symptoms and recover completely,” Dr Mike Ryan, the WHO’s top emergencies expert, told a virtual news conference on Wednesday.

Ryan declined comment on reports that Gilead Science’s antiviral drug remdesivir could help treat COVID-19, saying further data was needed from clinical trials already under way.

“But we are hopeful this drug and others may prove to be helpful in treating COVID-19,” he said.

More than 3.11 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus around the world, and more than 216,000 have died, according to a Reuters tally on Wednesday.

CLINICIANS ON ALERT
Until now, children have largely escaped some of the more serious complications of COVID-19, which has hit older adults and those with chronic conditions hardest.

The WHO’s clinical network has discussed the report from Britain about a small number of children with an inflammatory response, WHO epidemiologist Dr. Maria van Kerkhove said.

“There are some recent rare descriptions of children in some European countries that have had this inflammatory syndrome, which is similar to Kawasaki syndrome, but it seems to be very rare,” she said.

“We have asked the global network of clinicians to be alert on this so they capture information systematically, so we can better understand and guide treatment.”

Ryan, asked about Sweden’s strategy of shunning lockdowns and allowing most schools and businesses to remain open, said: “If we are to reach a ‘new normal’, in many ways Sweden represents a future model.”

“What it has done differently is that it really, really has trusted its own communities to implement that physical distancing,” he said, adding that Sweden had put in place a “very strong public health policy”.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus defended the agency’s record in handling the pandemic since the new virus emerged late last year in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.

The Geneva-based U.N. body has been heavily criticised in recent weeks, especially by its top donor, the United States, which has cut off funding.

Tedros presented a timeline of what the agency knew when in the lead-up to declaring COVID-19 a global emergency on Jan. 30.

“From the beginning, the WHO has acted quickly and decisively to respond to warn the world,” he said. “We sounded the alarm early, and we sounded it often.”

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...en-in-children-is-rare-who-says-idUSKBN22B2KD
 
The head of the World Health Organization has rejected suggestions it should have declared a global health emergency on the coronavirus sooner.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual media briefing that the 30 January declaration was made in "enough time for the rest of the world to respond" because at that stage there were only 82 cases of infection and no deaths outside China.

Also at the briefing, the agency's head of emergencies, Mike Ryan, said the WHO was seeing worrying increases in cases of Covid-19 in Haiti, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Yemen, Syria, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and northern Nigeria.

Asked about US President Donald Trump's claim to have seen evidence suggesting the virus started in a Chinese lab, Ryan reiterated that the new coronavirus was of natural origin.
 
LONDON/GENEVA (Reuters) - Parts of the world are starting to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic and to cautiously resume some sort of normal life, but the new coronavirus will pose significant risks until vaccines are developed, the WHO’s top emergencies expert said on Sunday.

FILE PHOTO: Executive Director of the World Health Organization's (WHO) emergencies program Mike Ryan speaks at a news conference on the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) in Geneva, Switzerland February 6, 2020. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse/File Photo
Mike Ryan, executive director of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) emergencies programme, said while many countries are still in the eye of the storm, others were beginning to show it is possible to contain the disease to some extent.

“In that sense, there’s hope,” Ryan told Reuters in an online interview from Geneva.

“At a global level the situation is still very, very serious but the pattern of the disease and the trajectory of the virus is very different in different parts of the world right now,” he said.

“What we’re learning is that it is possible to get this disease under control and it is possible to begin resuming normal economic and social life, with a new way of having to do that, and with extreme caution and vigilance.”

However, some countries in Africa and in central and South America are still seeing “an upwards trajectory in cases” and although they may not appear to have a big problem yet, the availability of tests remains an issue, Ryan added.

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More than 3.44 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus globally and 243,015 have died, according to a Reuters tally as of Sunday.

Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December.

“We’re in the middle of the fight of our lives - all of us around the world,” Ryan said. “There’s going to be a significant and extended risk until we reach a point where we have a safe and effective vaccine available to all.”

Ryan said some countries, including China, South Korea, Singapore, New Zealand and others, had reached what he described as “a steady state” with regard to the spread of COVID-19.

Meanwhile Europe and North America are beginning to emerge from “very intense epidemics” of the disease and are now trying to navigate a safe exit from severe restrictions on economic and social activities imposed in the past few months, he said.

After months of severe lockdown, people in Italy and Spain were starting to enjoy a little more freedom on Sunday. Israel has opened some schools, while South Korea said it would further relax social distancing rules from May 6, allowing a phased re-opening of businesses.

Ryan said this showed “not that the virus can be beaten absolutely, but that we can reach a point where we have enough control over the virus that our social and economic lives can begin again”.

He reiterated, however, that any government seeking to relax restrictions should do so with extreme caution.

The WHO warned on Friday that countries must lift lockdowns gradually, while still being “on the look-out” for COVID-19 and ready to restore restrictions if the virus jumps back.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...-of-our-lives-but-there-is-hope-idUSKBN22F0PG
 
Technics 1210 said:
WHO should be held accountable for the debacle of the way they handled information.

Had WHO been accurate, then the lockdown may have come early, but no, not only did WHO claim C19 was 'Flu' like but also claimed human-to-human was not possible.

Instead the liberal left blame the leaders, and even accuse Trump and Boris for being both xenophobic and racist when banning flights to and from China.

You can't win with the left.
Click to expand...

Sometimes these so called leftist are the real danger to the world. They change their position and will always find fault with the govt.

Imagine same liberals spouting nonsense had Trump not banned the flights to/from China.
They are never satisfied.
 
WHO has a lot to answer after countries somewhat gets a bit normal.
 
The US government has provided no evidence to support “speculative” claims that the coronavirus originated from a lab in the Chinese city of Wuhan, a senior World Health Organization (WHO) expert has said.

Dr Michael Ryan, speaking at a WHO briefing in Geneva, was questioned about the unsubstantiated theory, often touted by US President Donald Trump.

“We have not received any data from the US government relating to the purported origin of the virus.

From our perspective, this remains speculative,” Dr Ryan, head of the WHO’s Covid-19 response unit, said.

Dr Ryan said all the evidence suggested “the virus is of natural origin”. He called for a science-based, not a political, inquiry into the origins of the virus.
 
CanadianG00se said:
Sometimes these so called leftist are the real danger to the world. They change their position and will always find fault with the govt.

Imagine same liberals spouting nonsense had Trump not banned the flights to/from China.
They are never satisfied.
Click to expand...

I seriously cannot believe how the left and democrats are backing WHO and China. I believe Bill gates increased WHO funding after Trump announced cuts. Ridiculous!!!
 
WHO urges countries to investigate early COVID-19 cases


GENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that a report that COVID-19 had emerged in December in France, sooner than previously thought, was “not surprising”, and urged countries to investigate any other early suspicious cases.

The disease later identified as COVID-19 was first reported by Chinese authorities to the WHO on Dec. 31 and was not previously believed to have spread to Europe until January.

“This gives a whole new picture on everything,” WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier told a U.N. briefing in Geneva, referring to the French report.

“The findings help to better understand the potential virus circulation of COVID-19,” he added, saying other earlier cases could emerge after retesting samples.

A French hospital which retested old samples from pneumonia patients discovered that it treated a man who had COVID-19 as early as Dec. 27, nearly a month before the French government confirmed its first cases.

There is not currently any suggestion that the virus emerged from anywhere other than Wuhan, China. It is thought that, instead, the French case was somehow connected to a person who travelled from there in December before the virus had been identified or reported by China, the WHO spokesman said.

However, the French patient, a fishmonger, is not thought to have a direct link to China or a history of recent travel and experts say the French case requires more investigation.

Lindmeier encouraged other countries to check records for pneumonia cases of unspecified origin in late 2019, since this would give a “new and clearer picture” of the outbreak.

Asked about the origins of the virus in China, Lindmeier stressed that it was “really, really important” to explore this.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says his country has evidence that the new coronavirus emerged from a laboratory in Wuhan, although scientists have advised the WHO that it is of animal origin.

“That may need further missions or a mission (to China) so we are looking forward to this,” Lindmeier said.

The WHO’s top emergencies expert, Dr Mike Ryan, said on Monday that the body’s chief had raised the issue of the origins of the virus “at the highest level” during a WHO mission to China in January.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...nvestigate-early-covid-19-cases-idUSKBN22H134
 
WHO warns of more lockdowns if transition not managed carefully

The head of the World Health Organization has warned of the risks of returning to lockdown if countries emerging from pandemic restrictions do not manage transitions “extremely carefully and in a phased approach”.

The WHO director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, listed a series of steps countries should take before lifting measures to control the spread of Covid-19, such as surveillance controls and health system preparedness.

He said at a virtual briefing in Geneva:

The risk of returning to lockdown remains very real if countries do not manage the transition extremely carefully and in a phased approach.

He also said it was not possible to return to business as usual when the pandemic eventually ebbs, stressing the need for investment in health systems.

“The Covid-19 pandemic will eventually recede but there can be no going back to business as usual,” he said.
 
Last edited:
MenInG said:
WHO warns of more lockdowns if transition not managed carefully

The head of the World Health Organization has warned of the risks of returning to lockdown if countries emerging from pandemic restrictions do not manage transitions “extremely carefully and in a phased approach”.

The WHO director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, listed a series of steps countries should take before lifting measures to control the spread of Covid-19, such as surveillance controls and health system preparedness.

He said at a virtual briefing in Geneva:

The risk of returning to lockdown remains very real if countries do not manage the transition extremely carefully and in a phased approach.

He also said it was not possible to return to business as usual when the pandemic eventually ebbs, stressing the need for investment in health systems.

“The Covid-19 pandemic will eventually recede but there can be no going back to business as usual,” he said.
Click to expand...

WHO just states the obvious all the time, no point having this incompetent body. They are responsible for the spread, they were sleeping initially and let the virus spread.
 
King-Misbah said:
WHO just states the obvious all the time, no point having this incompetent body. They are responsible for the spread, they were sleeping initially and let the virus spread.
Click to expand...

There just trying to be political now and get media spotlight - There like a little spoilt school girl
 
Republicans want review of aid to WHO, Democrat may subpoena Pompeo

Five U.S. Senate Republicans introduced a bill on Wednesday seeking a review of U.S. participation in the World Health Organization and other international institutions, after President Donald Trump’s administration suspended U.S. contributions to the U.N. health agency and accused it of mishandling the coronavirus pandemic.

Introduced by Chairman Jim Risch and four other Republican members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the “Multilateral Aid Review Act of 2020” would establish a task force to assess how well multilateral institutions carry out their missions and serve American interests.

The bill requires a report on 38 institutions. Besides the WHO, they include the World Bank; Asian, African, Inter-American and North American Development Banks, and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, as well as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, several U.N. organizations and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Trump suspended U.S. contributions to the WHO on April 14, accusing it of promoting China’s “disinformation” about the coronavirus outbreak and saying his administration would launch a review of the organization.

WHO officials have denied the claims and China insists it has been transparent and open. The United States is the WHO’s biggest donor.

“As we have seen most recently with questionable actions taken by the World Health Organization in response to the spread of COVID-19, it is critically important to have accountability and oversight of our assistance,” Risch said in a statement announcing the bill.

Trump administration officials have aggressively criticized China as the pandemic has killed more than 70,000 Americans and ravaged the U.S. economy. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday renewed his aggressive criticism, blaming China for hundreds of thousands of deaths worldwide.

Democrats have accused the Republican administration of seeking to distract from its own failings in addressing the health crisis. They said the WHO needs reforms, but said it should not be attacked in the middle of a pandemic.

Separately, a House of Representatives source said Representative Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, might subpoena Pompeo for missing a May 4 deadline to provide information for an investigation of the decision to suspend aid to the WHO.

Critics of the aid review bill said they were concerned the task force would be too partisan because Pompeo would be its chairman and members would be appointed by Trump.

The other sponsors of the bill were Senators David Perdue, Marco Rubio, Mitt Romney and Todd Young.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...ho-democrat-may-subpoena-pompeo-idUSKBN22I3AJ
 
BEIJING (Reuters) - China said on Thursday it supports the World Health Organization (WHO) in trying to pinpoint the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic and accused U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo of telling one lie after another in his attacks on Beijing.

The virus has killed more than 255,000 people worldwide, including more than 70,000 in the United States, the worst-affected country, since it was first identified in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December.

Pompeo accused China of withholding virus samples he said were needed for global vaccine research, and he demanded transparency. Most experts believe COVID-19 originated in a market selling wildlife and jumped from animals to people, but Pompeo and U.S. President Donald Trump have said there is evidence it came from a laboratory, without elaborating.

Pompeo also accused the WHO of being too slow to respond to the disease and said it “needs to still demand that there be an investigation” in China.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, addressing reporters in Beijing on Thursday, said China supported WHO efforts to investigate the origin of the pandemic.

“We are always open to cooperate with the WHO on matters, including on the question of origin,” she said. But she repeated a timeline of signals from France, Sweden and the United States itself that the virus may not have emerged in China.

“While scientists have not come to a conclusion, why is Secretary Pompeo drawing the hasty conclusion that the virus came from a Wuhan lab? Where is his proof? Show us the proof. If he cannot show any evidence, then he may still be in the process of making up this evidence.”

The WHO has urged countries to investigate any early suspicious cases and called earlier comments about a possible laboratory source by Pompeo “speculative”.

Hua said Pompeo had contradicted himself in interviews about the virus. “The reason why he contradicts himself is because he is always making up a lie to cover up another lie. This is an open secret.”

At a White House event on Wednesday, Trump, who is seeking re-election in November, called the virus the worst “attack” the United States had ever experienced, and blamed China for not stopping it.

“This is worse than Pearl Harbor. This is worse than the World Trade Center,” Trump said. “And it should have never happened. It could have been stopped at the source. It could have been stopped in China. It should have been stopped right at the source, and it wasn’t.”

He has accused the WHO of being “China-centric” and acting too slowly to fight the disease, and threatened to withdraw funds, while many scientists have said now is the time to increase funding and global cooperation to find a vaccine.

Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii in 1941 and al Qaeda militants flew hijacked airliners into the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001.

Hua said the only enemy was the virus.

“Because that is the common enemy of all of humanity... Faced with this mankind battle against the virus, China should be (a) U.S. comrade in arms, not enemy.”

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks about the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) during a media briefing at the State Department in Washington, U.S., May 6, 2020. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/Pool
She also said that Chinese local governments and companies had donated 9.6 million masks, 500,000 test kits, 305,000 pairs of gloves and 133,500 pairs of goggles to 55 cities in 30 U.S. states as of Tuesday.

Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a member of Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force, said in an interview published on Monday the best evidence showed the virus was not made in a lab, but appeared to have “evolved in nature and then jumped species”.

The European Union ambassador to China said on Thursday it was “regrettable” that part of an opinion piece about the pandemic co-authored by 27 European ambassadors and published in the official China Daily had been removed before publication.

A comparison between the original op-ed uploaded onto the EU embassy website and the one published on Tuesday by the China Daily showed that in a sentence beginning, “But the outbreak of the coronavirus”, the words that followed - “in China, and its subsequent spread to the rest of the world over the past three months” - had been removed.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...ing-covid-19-denounces-u-s-lies-idUSKBN22J10G
 
WHO is a joke of an organization that has caused thousands of lives and trillions of economic loss globally. Trump is doing the right thing by not giving a single dollar to these clowns.

Just shut down this useless organization.
 
It could take at least a year to determine the exact origins of the coronavirus pandemic, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Speaking in Geneva a little earlier, a WHO expert on viruses originating in animals said the evidence pointed to bats as the original source, with another animal acting as an intermediate host.

The organisation also repeated that it had not seen any evidence, cited by US president Donald Trump, that the virus could have originated in a Chinese laboratory.

Scientists aren’t sure where exactly the outbreak began. Evidence points to a market in Wuhan, but of 41 early cases of the virus, only 27 had a direct connection to the market, reports the BBC's Geneva correspondent Imogen Foulkes.

The virus will have jumped from bats to another animal before infecting humans, but which animal remains unclear.

When the Middle East Respiratory Virus, or Mers, emerged in 2012, it took a year to discover the origin in camels.

Asked last week if there was any foundation in the US claims that the virus emerged from a laboratory, the WHO said that after reviewing evidence from multiple scientists, it was assured the outbreak was natural in origin.
 
China supports WHO-led review into virus response

China says it supports a World Health Organization-led review into the global response to the coronavirus outbreak "after the pandemic is over".

China has come under increasing pressure after previously rejecting calls for an independent international investigation into the origin of the virus.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Friday that China would co-operate with WHO efforts to trace the origin, but rejected calls for an investigation.

She added that the review should "summarise the experience and deficiencies of the international response to the pandemic, strengthen the WHO's work, enhance the construction of countries' core public health capabilities, and provide suggestions to improve global preparedness against major infectious diseases
 
The World Health Organization says there is evidence that coronavirus causes a broader inflammatory response in some patients.

Answering a question about a study suggesting the virus could attack blood vessels, resulting in organ failure, the WHO’s Dr Mike Ryan said some patients had suffered cardiovascular inflammation, or encephalitis, but that the evidence so far showed the virus caused primarily respiratory illness.

He added that the WHO was collecting data on the different health impacts of the virus, saying it took time to understand which organs an emerging virus was targeting.

In response to questions about testing for the presence of the virus in waste water, or the usefulness of antibody tests, WHO experts said both were helpful. But Dr Ryan warned that with these measures "we seem to be avoiding the uncomfortable truth" that the only way to control and contain the virus was by "aggressive public health surveillance".
 
GENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday that “extreme vigilance” was needed as countries begin to exit from lockdowns imposed to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, amid global concerns about a second wave of infections.

Germany earlier reported an acceleration in new coronavirus infections after it took early steps to ease its lockdown. South Korea, another country that had succeeded in limiting virus infections, has seen a new outbreak in nightclubs.

“Now we are seeing some hope as many countries exit these lockdowns,” Dr Mike Ryan, head of the WHO’s emergencies programme, told an online news briefing, but he added that “extreme vigilance is required”.

“If the disease persists at a low level without the possibility to investigate clusters there’s always the possibility that the virus takes off again,” he said.

Governments around the world are struggling with the question of how to reopen their economies while still containing COVID-19, the lung disease caused by the new coronavirus.

WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the same briefing that lifting restrictions was “complex and difficult” and that the “slow, steady lifting of lockdowns” was key.

Tedros said that Germany, South Korea and China all had systems in place to respond to any resurgence in cases.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...e-needed-in-exit-from-lockdowns-idUSKBN22N277
 
The World Health Organization said that some treatments appear to be limiting the severity or length of the COVID-19 respiratory disease and said the body is focusing on learning more about four or five of the most promising ones.

"We do have some treatments that seem to be in very early studies limiting the severity or the length of the illness but we do not have anything that can kill or stop the virus," spokeswoman Margaret Harris told a virtual briefing, referring to the body's so-called Solidarity Trial of drugs against the disease.

"We do have potentially positive data coming out but we need to see more data to be 100 percent confident that we can say this treatment over that one," she added.
 
WHO: Initial warnings not taken seriously enough

Some countries suffering serious epidemics of the coronavirus did not take initial warnings from the World Health Organization seriously enough, the agency says.

Following allegations from the US that it has handled the pandemic badly, the WHO has reminded countries that in mid-January it warned all member states of the virus and by the end of that month had declared an international health emergency.

Throughout February, it says, it called on governments to begin rigorous testing and quarantining.

Asked about the very large outbreaks in the US and Brazil, a WHO spokeswoman said those warnings had not been seen as serious, reports Imogen Foulkes for BBC News in Geneva.

One reason, the spokeswoman said, was that many countries in the Americas and Europe had no memory of the damage a new infectious disease can do.

In Africa, which does have recent experience, she said countries knew that early intervention was effective and this could be why cases there were not rising so fast.
 
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