President Biden interrupted the United States’ departure from the World Health Organization on his first day in office. The premise of his decision is that reforming international institutions internally is more effective than leaving or retaining funds, and this theory will be tested quickly.
“China has complete control over the World Health Organization,” said Donald Trump last year, when announcing the departure of the United States. This was a typical hyperbole, but he was right. WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus flattered China’s response to the virus – “very impressive and beyond words” – while Beijing destroyed samples of the virus, neutralized whistleblowers and spread conspiracy theories.
WHO officials in particular considered speaking openly, but calculated that the Chinese Communist Party would be even less cooperative if criticized publicly. The agency’s reticence did not help much. A team of WHO experts went to Beijing to study the origins of the virus in February 2020 – when their chances of finding out how it transferred from animals to humans were significantly better than today – but the Chinese government stopped them.
Negotiations with Beijing dragged on until 2020. This month, Dr. Tedros finally met the discouraged complaint that he was “very disappointed” by the delays. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said it welcomed the presence of investigators just before they started arriving in the past few days. Take it as seriously as OJ Simpson’s promise to make finding his ex-wife’s killer “my main goal in life.”
Media reports say Beijing has pressured WHO to delegate critical research work to Chinese scientists. The WHO team, at best, will obtain incomplete data, because research on the origins of Covid-19 cannot be published in China without the approval of the Communist Party. The Chinese government also approved the WHO mission members and agenda.