Did China pressure World Health Organisation not to declare international emergency?
China’s status as a major superpower may have influenced the World Health Organisation’s decision not to declare coronavirus an international emergency, experts have warned.
More than 1,300 people have been infected globally with the virus traced to a seafood market in the central city of Wuhan that was illegally selling wildlife.
Despite this, the WHO has failed to declare a global health crisis. On Thursday the organisation said it was ‘too early’ for such a decision but added an emergency could still be declared if the outbreak continues to spread.
‘This should not be taken as a sign that we don’t think the outbreak is serious, or that we are not taking it seriously,’ said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
‘Nothing could be further from the truth.’
Now, baffled experts have warned that their decision may have been influenced by China.
Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, told The Daily Telegraph: ‘The criteria for declaring a public health emergency of international concern have been met.’
But ‘not all WHO decisions are made based on the developments in the biological world,’ he added.
"The World Health Organization decided against declaring the outbreak a global emergency for now. The declaration can increase resources to fight a threat but its potential to cause economic damage makes the decision politically fraught."
Once a global emergency is declared, I'll bet there are all *kinds* of shipping / travel / transport / reporting / red tape restrictions that cost lots and LOTS of money that China doesn't have at the moment due to their swine Ebola (must be protein from outside the country) and tariffs from one President Donald Trump, causing manufacturers to leave their country.
...not that this pandemic will HELP, nor will the quarantine: but getting sick is not a government policy in the same way a trade war with the US is.