Discovering the origins of COVID-19 is a moral imperative and all hypotheses must be explored, the head of the World Health Organization said, in the clearest indication yet that the UN body remains committed to finding how the virus arose.
A US agency was reported by the Wall Street Journal to have assessed the pandemic had likely been caused by an unintended Chinese laboratory leak, raising pressure on the WHO to come up with answers. Beijing denies the assessment. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Twitter late on Saturday, "Understanding COVID19's origins and exploring all hypotheses remains: a scientific imperative, to help us prevent future outbreaks and a moral imperative, for the sake of the millions of people who died and those who live with long COVID." He was writing to mark three years since the WHO first used the word "pandemic" to describe the global outbreak of COVID-19. The WHO has set up a scientific advisory group on dangerous pathogens but it has not yet reached any conclusions on how the pandemic began, saying key pieces of data are missing
Politicians and medical experts, in a message released over the weekend, said the focus of the anniversary should be on preventing a repeat of the unequal COVID-19 vaccine rollout.
Source: VOV5