Cooperate with probe into the origins of Covid-19: WHO chief tells China

A man is vaccinated against Covid-19 in Villa Elisa, Paraguay on Saturday. Pic/AFP

World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Ghebreyesus has called on China to cooperate with the ongoing investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 amid renewed call to further probe the virus.

Dr Tedros made these remarks after taking part in the Group of Seven (G7) summit by video conference on Saturday, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported. The WHO Director-General hoped there would be better cooperation and transparency when the next phase of the probe into the virus's origin is underway.

"As you know we will need cooperation from the Chinese side," he said. "We need transparency to understand or know or find the origin of this virus...after the report was released there were difficulties in the data sharing, especially in the raw data." He further said that the preparations for the probe's next steps were underway and that the issue of the origin of the virus was discussed by G7 leaders on Saturday, WSJ reported.

Tedros Ghebreyesus, WHO chief

Earlier this week, the US and the UK had extended support to a "timely, transparent and evidence-based independent process" for the next phase of the WHO-convened study of Covid-19 origins.

World leaders gathered at the G7 Summit in Cornwall discussed the possibility that a laboratory leak in central China's Wuhan city may have a connection with the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, with Dr Tedros saying all hypotheses behind the origins of the deadly disease remain in play.

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said that officials "compared notes" over the theory that the pandemic may have originated from a leak from a lab in Wuhan, calling for further investigations.

Dr Tedros told reporters on Saturday that the theory was raised during a formal session at the G7 summit in Cornwall dedicated to health matters and that identifying the source of the pandemic was a core part of showing respect to the millions of people around the globe who have died from the deadly virus.

"The first phase of the origin study was not conclusive so there are four hypotheses, but [it's] not conclusive yet. So we believe that all four hypotheses should be open, and we need to proceed with the second phase, to really know the origins," said Dr Tedros.

"As you know, more than 174 million people have been confirmed for Covid illness. This is actually an underestimate, it could be more. And so far, close to 3.75 million people have died. This is very tragic and I think the respect these people deserve is knowing what the origin of this virus is so that we can prevent it from happening again," he said, stressing on the importance of "cooperation from the Chinese side".

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4,10,497
No. of new cases reported globally in the past 24 hours

17,49,18,667
Total no. of cases worldwide

37,82,490
Total no. of deaths worldwide

Source: WHO/Johns Hopkins

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