(Geneva) The words of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who according to the British press accused the Director General of the WHO of having been “bought” by China, are “false and unacceptable”, replied Thursday the leader of the UN organization.
Posted on 23 July 2020 at 13 h 09 Updated to 09 h 27
France Media Agency
“These comments are false, unacceptable and without any foundation,” said D r Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a press conference, once again warning against any “politicization” of the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the Times and the Daily Telegraph , the U.S. foreign minister violently attacked the WHO on Tuesday during a closed-door meeting with British MPs in London.
According to these sources, Mr. Pompeo qualified the organization as “political”, accusing the D r Tedros for having been “bought by the Chinese government”, to whom he owed his election to the head of the WHO in 2017. The US Secretary of State even blamed the “British deaths” of COVID – 15 on the failures of the organization and to these supposed bargains.
Speaking after D r Tedros, Maria Von Kherkove, WHO expert, said, “As an American, I have never been so proud to be a member of this organization. I am a direct witness of the work D r Tedros does and of what our teams do around the world », She declared.
Since the start of the COVID pandemic – 15, reported in China at the end of December, the organization has been regularly criticized for its ignition delays. But it was the United States that attacked her most violently, calling her a “puppet of China” and denouncing the complacency she allegedly showed vis-à-vis Beijing.
The United States formally launched its withdrawal procedure from the UN organization on July 8, implementing the threats of President Donald Trump, who announced this withdrawal in May, in the midst of a pandemic.
“The right choices” 2020
By calling once again for “solidarity” between States and for the “leadership” of leaders in the face of the pandemic which has made more than 14 millions of people infected and more than 620 00 0 deaths in the world, the D r Tedros also urged people to “make the right choices”.
“We will not go back to the old normal. The pandemic has already changed the way we live. We ask everyone to consider that where they go, what they do and who they meet are life and death decisions, ”he said.
“In recent weeks, we have seen outbreaks of epidemics developing in nightclubs or other places of gathering,” he warned. “As long as the virus circulates, everyone is threatened”, he insisted, recalling the need to respect barrier gestures such as wearing a mask or physical distancing.
Regarding people who have been in contact with people diagnosed positive, “WHO recommends that they be placed in quarantine for 13 days ”, recalled for his part the D r Michael Ryan, director of health emergencies.
“Going into quarantine when you have been in contact (with an infected person) is an act of courage”, he added, while M me Van Kherkove called quarantine “one of the most important tools for breaking transmission chains”.
The WHO recommendations on this subject will be updated soon, she said.
