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Tedros confirmed, during a briefing to the member states of the World Health Organization, on the report, which was officially published on Tuesday, that although experts who conducted research in January and February in China on the origin of the virus concluded that the hypothesis of the escape of the virus from a laboratory is the least probable, “The matter requires a more extensive investigation, probably through new missions with specialized experts that I am willing to send”.
This hypothesis, that the virus that causes Covid-19 could have leaked from a laboratory, was strongly defended by the previous US administration, led by Donald Trump, based on information from the intelligence services. But China has always vehemently denied this possibility.
Tedros had been speaking before the official release of the report that international experts “expressed difficulties in accessing primary data” during their stay in China, a rare public criticism of how China handled this joint investigation.
“I hope that new joint studies will be based on sharing data more widely and quickly,” he said.
The head of the delegation of international experts, Peter Ben Embark, played down the matter at a press conference, saying that “in China as elsewhere, some data cannot be shared for reasons of respect for privacy.”
The Director General of the World Health Organization stressed that “this report is a very important beginning, but it is not a final word.”
