WHO runs cover for China’s deadly Covid deceptions

WHO team members Peter Daszak, second from right, and Peter Ben Embarek, right, pose for a picture as Daszak leaves their hotel in Wuhan after the investigation. Picture: AFP

The World Health Organisation’s refusal to hold the Chinese government accountable for the COVID pandemic all but ensures history will repeat. The WHO’s initial report on the origins of COVID effectively absolved the Chinese Communist Party of responsibility for its spread from a mainland epidemic into a global pandemic. Once again, the United Nations is failing to defend humankind against the menace of a totalitarian state.

Its latest report seems more like CCP propaganda than science. And that is despite the expertise in the WHO mission team, with expert epidemiologists, medical doctors, virologists, animal and human disease experts drawn from 10 countries, as well as WHO staff.

The Lancet reported that before the trip, mission leader Ben Embarek said he was not expecting “clear answers after the initial mission”. A major difficulty in determining the origins of the COVID-19 outbreak is the retrospective nature of the investigation. The CCP impeded scientific inquiry by ordering the destruction of viral samples at medical institutes, silencing whistleblowers and preventing access to key sites. The party has ensured the truth will not come out.

Embarek provoked controversy by trotting out theories about the COVID outbreak that were strikingly similar to CCP propaganda. The most controversial was that he had ruled out the lab leak hypothesis, which arises from the belief that the virus leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

One problem is that Embarek appeared to deny the validity of the hypothesis without testing it scientifically. Another is the perception that there were conflicts of interest in the investigation that compromised its independence. China is a major funder of the WHO and at least one member of the mission team has a close relationship with the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Peter Daszak heads the EcoHealth Alliance, an organisation that researches coronaviruses and has worked in China for about 15 years. According to Taiwan News, the organisation has received millions in funding from the US National Institutes of Health, and a significant portion has gone to the WIV. A video taken in early December 2019 shows Daszak discussing research at the WIV, including the modification of coronaviruses in the lab. In June, he penned a strongly worded piece for The Guardian, dismissing questions about possible WIV involvement in the viral outbreak. He drew attention to the wilder claims COVID was deliberately engineered.

But the lab leak hypothesis becomes more plausible when it is restricted to the question of whether a novel virus was being studied in the lab and human error resulted in an accidental leak. The Guardian added a note to Daszak’s article after publication, stating it had been amended “to make clear the writer’s past work with researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology”.

Embarek stirred more controversy by lending legitimacy to the CCP’s politics of distraction when he suggested the virus could have originated outside China. The CCP has promoted the line since the early days of the outbreak in a game of blame shifting. Once again, Embarek failed to tender scientific evidence in support of his CCP-friendly theory.

Australians have reason for some pride when considering the history of the pandemic, and the attempt to unravel its cause and origin.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison led the charge for an independent investigation into the origins of COVID-19 and withstood the wrath of the CCP for doing so. A leading Australian epidemiologist, Raina MacIntyre, criticised the WHO last week for ruling out the lab leak hypothesis without sufficient proof. The Australian’s Health Editor, Natasha Robinson, reported that MacIntyre questioned the WHO’s lack of supporting evidence when it dismissed some theories while entertaining others. She clarified the importance of testing hypotheses, as any good scientist would.

The Australian scientist on the WHO team, Dominic Dwyer, maintained that the virus originated in China. Speaking to Nine News, he said “the evidence for it starting elsewhere in the world is actually very limited. There is some evidence but it’s not really very good”. Dwyer said the most likely source of the virus was bats and it had likely been circulating in the Wuhan community for some time before an “amplifying event” at the Wuhan market.

Scientists have also questioned why the WHO team offered legitimacy to the CCP’s fantastical claim that the virus might have arrived with a batch of frozen food. Are we really supposed to credit this idea when the virus spread from China, the Chinese government has a track record of lying about virus outbreaks and it destroyed viral samples at the start of the pandemic?

The CCP has worked hard to conceal the truth about the origins of COVID-19. Its role in withholding key data that could have prevented the pandemic is well documented. However, the WHO has not investigated this. Instead, its latest report has bolstered absurd claims popularised by the CCP. At best, the WHO could be playing a tactical game of appeasement to obtain sensitive information. At worst, its appeasement of a totalitarian state is the new normal in international relations.