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The report, written by WHO researcher Francesco Zambon and 10 other European colleagues, was funded by the government of Kuwait with the aim of providing information to countries where the coronavirus had not yet reached, with Italy being the first severely affected European country. for the pandemic and one of the first in the world. world.
The document, called “An unprecedented challenge: Italy’s first intervention against COVID-19”, was published on the WHO website on May 13 and downloaded a day later.
The 102-page report said Italy’s plan to fight a pandemic had not been updated since 2006 and that due to a lack of preparation, the initial response from hospitals was “makeshift, chaotic and creative.”
He also added that it took some time for the formal protocols to be formulated.
The document was allegedly withdrawn at the request of Ranieri Guerra, WHO’s deputy director of strategic initiatives. Guerra was Director General of Preventive Medicine at the Italian Ministry of Health from 2014 to 2017 and is therefore responsible for updating the pandemic plan in accordance with new recommendations from the WHO and the European Center for the Prevention and Control of Diseases (ECDC).
Guerra is currently among the scientists of the Italian government’s anti-Covid task force.
The outdated plan is a crucial component of preliminary investigations by prosecutors in Bergamo, a city in Lombardy, the epicenter of Italy’s COVID-19 pandemic, linked to possible criminal negligence by authorities.
Italy surpassed 62,000 deaths caused by COVID-19 on Thursday, the highest number recorded by a European country.
Ranieri Guerra, Deputy Director of Strategic Initiatives, WHO
Audience blocking
Prosecutors also use a report prepared after the first wave of the pandemic by an army reserve general, Pier Paolo Lunelli, who concluded that up to 10,000 deaths caused by COVID-19 could be due to insufficient training from Italian authorities.
Investigator Zambon, who has his office at WHO headquarters in Venice, was summoned three times to speak to Italian prosecutors, but was met with opposition from the WHO, who insisted that he and the other 10 investigators involved in the writing the report in May should benefit. immunity.
Only Guerra, the deputy director of the WHO, was heard by Italian prosecutors, but the content of the conversation was not disclosed.
After the first subpoenas were issued on behalf of Zambon and the other investigators, the WHO said Italian prosecutors should turn to diplomatic channels and make their requests through the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Zambon received the last subpoena on December 10, but the WHO again prohibited him from appearing at the hearings despite asking for approval to speak to prosecutors.
“When I received the first subpoenas, I notified the WHO legal department, and shortly thereafter they responded that they could not go because they were protected by immunity, even though they wanted to go because they had something to say,” Zambon told The Guardian. .
Zambon also claims that Guerra threatened to fire him if he did not change the part of the report that refers to not updating the pandemic plan.
Furthermore, it states that despite notifying senior WHO officials of the threats and risks they pose to the organization’s transparency and neutrality, it has not initiated any internal investigation.
Hans Kluge, WHO Director for Europe
Plan “copy and paste”
At the time, the WHO did not explain why the report was withdrawn, but said in a statement last week that it “contained inaccurate and inconsistent data.”
The document does not criticize the Italian government, but highlights the critical points in the management of the pandemic, based on the antiquated pandemic plan that was only “reconfirmed” and not updated in 2017, according to Zambon.
“The team verified this in detail and found that all plans approved after 2006 were just copied with copy and paste, without even changing a comma in the text,” he said.
Zambon claims that a month before the report was published, he sent a summary of Guerra’s findings, which he showed to Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza.
The emails received by Zambon in May from the war and Hans Kluge, the WHO director for Europe, who wrote the introduction to the deleted document, also appear to suggest an agreement between the Italian Ministry of Health and the WHO to keep the report in place. the drawer.
The documents, consulted by journalists from The Guardian, were recently revealed by a documentary Report, an investigative program on Italian public television Rai.
In a May 13 email, Guerra wrote Zambon “don’t forget” that.[guvernul italian] he just gave it to us [OMS] a voluntary contribution of 10 million based on trust and recognition of what we have done so far … after 6 years with nothing ”.
An email received by Zambon from Hans Kluge on May 15 states that: “[raportul] it does not take away a key aspect: my relationship with the ministry, which was very disappointing.
Kluge concludes his email by stating that he will write to the Italian Ministry of Health to form a group of experts from WHO, the Italian Ministry of Health and other health institutions to review the document.
“Kuwait (the one who commissioned the report) is happy, now we have to do MoH (happy Italian Ministry of Health),” Kluge wrote.
The WHO noted in an email sent to The Guardian journalists on Thursday that “we are currently working with the Italian government to clarify the issue.”
The Italian Ministry of Health denied in a statement any involvement in the removal of the report:
“As far as we know, this is not an official WHO document and it was never sent to the Ministry of Health, which therefore never evaluated it and did not comment on it. Any information related to it does not come from institutional sources ”.
Roberto Speranza, Italian Minister of Health
Criminal implications
If Bergamo prosecutors discover that Italy has not updated its pandemic plan, all Italian health ministers and prime ministers from 2013 so far risk being indicted.
Antonio Chiappani, chief prosecutor of the Bergamo prosecutor’s office, told Corriere della Sera this week that: “Italy was not prepared for Covid, there were a lot of improvisations … we have to find out why there were so many victims compared to other places” .
Zambon says the information in his report could have prevented deaths in countries that were later hit by the pandemic.
“I tried desperately to write to all the important officials, including the general manager [Tedros Adhanom], warning them of the danger [blocării raportului]He says.
“Its publication had the potential to save lives and the legal responsibility of the WHO was at stake, because a personal conflict of interest was considered more important than sharing the lessons learned by the country most affected at the time,” Zambon said.
The WHO said in a statement that Guerra had spoken with prosecutors “in a personal capacity,” noting that “WHO staff is made up of international officials who carry out all their activities impartially and without fear of punishment or without expecting favors.” .
“In order to maintain its objectivity and independence, WHO does not normally get involved in legal matters at the national level,” the institution added.
Zambon did not receive a formal refusal from the WHO to appear at the hearings after the December 10 subpoena, but was informed on Wednesday evening that the organization had written to the Italian Foreign Ministry informing it that:
“Zambon and the other WHO experts mentioned above were asked not to appear at these hearings.”
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