WHO Assured Strength in Solidarity as Criticisms by Trump Lead to Investigations About Their Response to COVID-19 Pandemic
In the letter, Trump said he would give the organization 30 days before the United States would cut off funding for the W.H.O. indefinitely. He required them to be held accountable for the global crisis and expected improvements within the month.
Members of the W.H.O. replied with suggestions of conducting an independent investigation on how the organization responded to the outbreak of the coronavirus to its global spread.
W.H.O. and China
In recent weeks, Trump made allegations against the W.H.O., claiming that they must have been conspiring with China. The latter country has had its share of criticisms, largely driven by Sinophobia and racism from every corner of the world.
Specifically, Trump added that the organization should have been more responsible in challenging the news that President and General Secretary Xi Jinping provided about the condition and nature of the coronavirus. The government of the People's Republic was widely believed to be omitting important information from their public.
For instance, China reports of confirmed coronavirus cases were significantly fewer despite that the COVID-19 pandemic originated there and that it was densely populated. Hong Kong researchers expect that the figure of deaths was at least four times greater than the news reported.
Member of the National Security Council John Ullyot said that China had a "special" responsibility to account for the losses sustained during the pandemic. In response to this, Xi said that China's responsibility would wait until the coronavirus would be fully controlled.
This week, Trump told the W.H.O. to "clean up their act". He added that it would only be fair to the countries for them to be able to do a better job at handling the coronavirus.
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Officials voice their criticisms
Trump's comments were met with negative responses. Director of the O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law Lawrence O. Gostin said that Trump's direct disapproval of the W.H.O. would cost lives just when the world "was trying to come together" over the pandemic.
Right behind the W.H.O. was other superpower country Russia, whose speaker of the upper house of the Parliament Valentina I. Matviyenko explained that there was no reason to conduct investigations about how the organization allegedly overlooked crucial information about the novel coronavirus.
In a somewhat similar fashion, Virginie Battu-Henriksson from the European Commission said that the pandemic should not bring out the bad side to people. She added that making accusations would get in the way of solidarity.
Despite all these shady remarks, director general of the W.H.O. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus instead chose to respond by saying that he would also let an investigation be conducted regarding the organization's response to the virus, especially during the time it should have been contained in China.
Ghebreyesus ended the assembly on Tuesday by saying that the pandemic was close to tearing international cooperation. But amidst the problems and differences, he assured that people were "stronger together" as one human race.
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