Coronavirus: WHO leader faces calls to resign over claims he ‘deceived’ on China cover-up

Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus is facing growing calls for his resignation because he has repeatedly denied that China was less than transparent in informing the rest of the world about the disease. The World Health Organization, WHO, receives funding from China and is dependent on the regime of the Communist Party on many levels. Its international experts didn’t get access to the country until Director-General Tedros Adhanom visited President Xi Jinping at the end of January.

Before then, the WHO was uncritically repeating information from the Chinese authorities.

In amidst of the pandemic, the organisation has faced accusations it ignored warnings from Taiwanese doctors, who are unrepresented in by the WHO.

The World Health Organization, at the behest of China, does not recognise Taiwan.

The United Nations body was reluctant to declare “public health emergency of international concern" and had to play catch up with media organisations around the world that declared it before them.

After Director-General Tedros Adhanom's Beijing visit the WHO said in a statement that it appreciated “especially the commitment from top leadership and the transparency they have demonstrated”.

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Only after this meeting did it declared, on January 30, a public health emergency of international concern.

And after China reported only a few new cases each day, WHO declared the coronavirus a pandemic, only on March 11.

By this time it had spread globally.

The WHO has been eager to broadcast Beijing’s narrative on how the pandemic developed.

Doctor Tedros said: “In the face of a previously unknown virus, China has rolled out perhaps the most ambitious, agile and aggressive disease containment effort in history."

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WHO experts said in their February report on the mission to China that the country had gained “invaluable time for the response” in an “all-of-government and all-of society approach” that has averted or delayed hundreds of thousands of cases and protected the global community.

Republican Senator Martha McSally said Doctor Tedros should resign over this "Chinese cover-up".

She told Fox News that part of the blame for China's lack of transparency lay with the WHO director-general.

Ms McSally claimed 55-year-old "deceived the world".

She added that she "never trusted a communist" and that the Chinese government's "cover-up of this virus that originated with them has caused unnecessary deaths around America and around the world.

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"I think Doctor Tedros needs to step down."

The senator added: "Doctor Tedros deceived the world.

"At one point, he even praised China's 'transparency during its coronavirus response efforts.

"Despite a mountain of evidence showing the regime concealed the severity of the outbreak.

"This deception cost lives."

Express.co.uk has contacted the World Health Organization for comment.