World Health Organization Taken to Task for Its COVID-19 Actions | Eastern North Carolina Now

Publisher's note: The author of this post is Mitch Kokai for the John Locke Foundation.

    Nicholas Eberstadt and Dan Blumenthal write in the New York Post about one major player that deserves blame for the extent of the COVID-19 pandemic. It's a group that should have done more in the earliest days of the coronavirus scare.

• The fog of war obscures much about the novel coronavirus pandemic. But two facts seem absolutely certain. First, China's Communist authorities have lied, concealed and misled about the origins of the epidemic and the toll of the virus in China. Second, the World Health Organization has acted as Beijing's handmaid.
• The result: The global toll of the tragedy will be much greater than it need have been.
• We shouldn't be surprised that the Beijing regime lies about the epidemic: It lies about, well, ­everything. From economic data to air pollution figures, the Communist Party doctors information to protect and promote itself. ...
• ... Which brings us to the WHO's malfeasance in this affair. The WHO should have known at the outset that it was dealing with a bad-faith actor in Beijing. Yet ­instead of immediately insisting upon access, openness and transparency from China, WHO leadership followed the Chinese lead and at times even took the Chinese line.
• The very fact that truth-seekers are left counting urns is an indictment not only of the Beijing ­regime, but also of the WHO. To help stem the pandemic, the WHO should have been tirelessly pressing China to tell the truth.
• Far from sounding an alarm, however, the UN outfit was ­impassive while Beijing stonewalled international health ­authorities for weeks. Indeed, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus praised the Chinese regime for its "transparency" in the crisis. Tedros, ­recall, was Beijing's candidate for WHO chief and owes his job to China's campaign for him at the United Nations.

    Follow Carolina Journal Online's comtinuing coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic;s impact in North Carolina. You'll find the latest strories HERE.