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■ The World Health Organization, the U.S. and 13 other countries voice frustration with access granted by China for an international mission to Wuhan.
The head of the World Health Organization, the U.S. government and 13 other countries on Tuesday voiced frustration with the level of access China granted an international mission to Wuhan — a striking and unusually public rebuke.
The comments came as the team tasked with probing the origins of the coronavirus pandemic issued a report on its roughly month-long visit to the central Chinese city.
The report, obtained by The Washington Post on Monday, offers the most detailed look yet at what happened in the early days of the outbreak, but leaves key questions unanswered and has been overshadowed by concern about Chinese influence.
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a briefing to member states on Tuesday that he expected “future collaborative studies to include more timely and comprehensive data sharing” — the most pointed comments to date from an agency that has been solicitous to China through most of the pandemic.
He said there is a particular need for a “full analysis” of the role of animal markets in Wuhan and that the report did not conduct an “extensive enough” assessment of the possibility the virus was introduced to humans through a laboratory incident.
The report, officially released Tuesday, concludes that the role of markets is unclear and that the idea it could have leaked from a Wuhan lab does not warrant further investigation.
The United States, Britain, Korea, Israel, Japan and others issued a joint statement expressing concern. “Together, we support a transparent and independent analysis and evaluation, free from interference and undue influence,” it reads.
White House spokesperson Jen Psaki said at a news conference that the mission was denied access to crucial data and therefore presented “a partial and incomplete picture.”
China, she said, has “not been transparent, they have not provided underlying data. That certainly doesn’t qualify as cooperation.”