WHO reiterates call on China to provide crucial data and access to understand origins of COVID-19

Geneva: Five years after the global Covid-19 pandemic claimed millions of lives, the World Health Organization (WHO) reaffirmed its demand that China provide access to vital data to help determine the virus’s origins, citing this as a “moral and scientific imperative.” WHO has cautioned that the globe is still susceptible to future outbreaks in the absence of international cooperation and openness.

“We continue to call on China to share data and access so we can understand the origins of Covid-19,” the WHO stated in a statement released on Monday. This is both scientifically and morally required. The world cannot effectively prevent and prepare for future pandemics and epidemics without international collaboration, sharing, and openness.

It further said, “On December 31, 2019, five years ago, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission posted a media announcement on their website about instances of ‘viral pneumonia’ in Wuhan, China, which was picked up by WHO’s Country Office in China. The world and our lives were shaped by COVID-19 in the weeks, months, and years that followed. As soon as the new year arrived, we got to work at WHO. Employees of WHO notified the globe on January 4, 2020, after activating emergency systems on January 1, 2020. WHO released its first complete set of guidelines for nations between January 9–12. On January 13, we convened with partners to provide the plan for the first SARS-CoV-2 laboratory test.

The statement continued, “As we mark this milestone, let’s take a moment to honour the lives changed and lost, recognize those who are suffering from Covid-19 and long Covid, express gratitude to the health workers who sacrificed so much to care for us, and commit to learning from Covid-19 to build a healthier tomorrow.”

WHO continued in discussing the need for researching and exchanging information about the virus’s origins with China and other Member States throughout 2020.

To organize collaborative research including Chinese and independent foreign experts, WHO sent a small team to China in July 2020. Australia, China, Denmark, Germany, Japan, Kenya, the Netherlands, Qatar, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Vietnam were among the countries represented on the scientific team.