Email: 65 COVID-19 cases in WHO Switzerland staff
GENEVA – The World Health Organization recorded 65 cases of the coronavirus among staff based at its headquarters, including at least one cluster of infections, an internal email obtained by The Associated Press shows, despite the agency’s past assertions that there has been no transmission at the Geneva site.
The revelation came amid a surge of cases in Europe, host country Switzerland, and the city of Geneva, in particular, and the email said about half of the infections were in people who had been working from home. But 32 were in staff who had been working on premises at the headquarters building, indicating that the health agency’s strict hygiene, screening and other prevention measures were not sufficient to spare it from the pandemic.
Farah Dakhlallah, a WHO spokeswoman, confirmed the accuracy of the information about the case count in an email to the AP and that officials were still investigating.
“We have not yet established whether transmission occurred on campus, but are looking into the matter,” Dakhlallah said.
Raul Thomas, who heads business operations at WHO, emailed staff on Friday noting that five people – four on the same team and one who had contact with them– had tested positive for COVID-19. While the email did not use the term “cluster,” one is generally defined as two or more cases in the same area, and the five cases indicate basic infection control and social distancing procedures were likely being broken.
A previous email he sent on Oct. 16 indicated that no clusters had been found at the site.
“As per standard protocols, these colleagues are receiving the necessary medical attention and are recovering at home,” the email Friday said. “These last five cases bring the total reported number of affected members of the Geneva-based workforce to 65 since the beginning of the pandemic.”
The email did not specify who was infected, but a WHO staffer with direct knowledge of the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity said the cluster included a member of the WHO director-general’s leadership team who is also an infection control specialist.
Thomas’ email was sent after other WHO officials raised concerns that people who had been in contact with the cluster were still working in the Geneva building and potentially exposing others to COVID-19, the staffer said.
The senior manager reportedly held several in-person meetings at WHO in early November before testing positive last week. The person, contacted by the AP, referred all comments to the WHO media office.
WHO has faced repeated criticism of its handling of the pandemic. U.S. President Donald Trump accused the U.N. agency of “colluding” with China to hide the extent of the initial outbreak. In June, the AP found WHO publicly lauded China for its speed and transparency, even though private meetings showed WHO officials frustrated that the country sat on releasing critical outbreak information.
According to Thomas’ email, 49 of the overall cases had occurred in the last eight weeks, “thus very much in line with the situation being reported in Geneva and the surrounding areas.”