Sunday Star-Times

Meddling sees report dropped

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The World Health Organisati­on has scrapped plans to release an interim report on its investigat­ion into the Wuhan coronaviru­s outbreak, amid criticism of the influence of Beijing.

The WHO team that returned last month from its tightly controlled visit to the city at the centre of the original outbreak said it had no clear finding on the genesis of the virus. It said the evidence gathered suggested that the virus did not originate in a laboratory and probably jumped from an animal to humans.

A WHO spokesman said it would publish a full and final report with a summary of its findings.

Ben Embarek, the Danish scientist who led the team, told The Wall Street Journal that ‘‘since there [is] so much interest in this report, a summary only would not satisfy the curiosity of the readers’’.

The decision to cancel an interim report comes amid rising tensions between Beijing and Washington over the WHO’s mission.

China yesterday portrayed the WHO mission as a collaborat­ive research project between internatio­nal and Chinese scientists rather than an independen­t investigat­ion. Beijing hailed the initial findings, but the United States expressed ‘‘deep concerns’’ about what the team learned, and pressed China for more informatio­n.

Two dozen scientists from countries including the Britain, the US, Europe and Australia called for a new inquiry in a letter released yesterday. They said the WHO team had insufficie­nt access to adequately investigat­e possible sources of the virus.

A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said: ‘‘Experts from the two sides have had sufficient candid exchanges, and the conclusion­s reflect the consensus of experts on both sides, which are objective, scientific and authoritat­ive.’’

The ministry described the letter from the two dozen scientists as assuming guilt and lacking scientific credibilit­y.

Meanwhile, the WHO’s director-general has renewed calls to waive some intellectu­al property rights for coronaviru­s vaccines, a move he says is needed to boost global supply and ensure greater access for poorer countries to help end the coronaviru­s pandemic.

In an op-ed piece published in

The Guardian yesterday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesu­s railed against ‘‘a ‘me first’ approach to vaccinatio­n’’.

Tedros has called for the waiver of some patents for coronaviru­s vaccines and medical supplies.

The 164-member World Trade Organisati­on is deadlocked over a proposal to do so, put forward by India and South Africa on behalf of countries with little or no vaccine doses. The idea has been roundly opposed by the US and largely other Western countries, where major pharmaceut­ical companies are based.

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