“Moral imperative”: WHO pressures China to share data on the origins of COVID | News of the coronavirus pandemic

The World Health Organization (WHO) has asked China to share information about how COVID-19 emerged five years ago.

The coronavirus has killed millions of people, locked billions in their homes, paralyzed economies and destroyed health systems.

“We continue to call on China to share data and access so we can understand the origins of COVID-19. This is a moral and scientific imperative,” WHO said in a statement.

“Without transparency, sharing, and cooperation between countries, the world cannot prevent and properly prepare for future epidemics and pandemics.”

The WHO reported how on December 31, 2019, its country office in China received a media statement from health authorities in the central city of Wuhan regarding cases of “viral pneumonia.”

“In the weeks, months and years that followed, COVID-19 came to shape our lives and our world,” the UN health agency said.

“As we mark this milestone, let’s take a moment to honor the lives changed and lost, recognize those suffering from COVID-19 and Long COVID, express gratitude to the healthcare workers who have sacrificed so much to care for us, and commit to learning from COVID -19 to build a healthier tomorrow.”

Beijing insisted on Tuesday that it shared information about the coronavirus “without holding anything back.”

“Five years ago… China immediately shared the epidemic information and the sequence of viral genes with the WHO and the international community. Without holding anything back, we shared our experience of prevention, control and treatment, making a great contribution to the international community’s pandemic-fighting work,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning.

“Painful Lessons”

According to the WHO, more than 760 million cases of COVID-19 and 6.9 million deaths have been recorded worldwide.

In mid-2023, he declared the end of COVID-19 as a public health emergency, but said the disease should be a permanent reminder of the potential for new viruses to emerge with devastating consequences.

Data from the early days of the pandemic were uploaded by Chinese scientists to an international database in early 2023, a few months after China dismantled all its COVID-19 restrictions and reopened its borders to the rest of the world.

The data showed that DNA from several animal species – including raccoon dogs – was present in environmental samples that tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID, suggesting they were “the most likely drivers” of the disease, according to a team of international researchers.

In 2021, a WHO-led team spent weeks in and around Wuhan – where the first cases were detected – and said that the virus had probably been transmitted from bats to humans through another animal, but more research was needed.

China said no more visits were needed and the search for the first cases should be carried out in other countries.

Earlier this month, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus addressed the issue of whether the world was better prepared for the next pandemic than for COVID-19.

“The answer is yes and no,” he said at a press conference. “If the next pandemic came today, the world would still be facing some of the same weaknesses and vulnerabilities that gave COVID-19 a place five years ago.

“But the world has also learned many of the painful lessons the pandemic has taught us, and has taken significant steps to strengthen its defenses against future epidemics and pandemics.”

In December 2021, frightened by the devastation caused by COVID, the countries decided to start drafting an agreement on the prevention, preparedness and response to a pandemic.

The 194 WHO member states negotiating the treaty have agreed on most of what it should include, but are deadlocked on practicalities.

A key fault line lies between Western nations with major pharmaceutical industry sectors and poorer countries wary of being sidelined when the next pandemic strikes.