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TAIPEI: Lives have been lost in the coronavirus pandemic because of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) exclusion of Taiwan and refusal to allow it to share best practices and information, a top US government commission on China said in a new report.
The United States has repeatedly clashed with China over its refusal to allow non-WHO member Taiwan, claimed by China as one of its provinces, full access to the body, becoming another source of rising tensions between Washington and Beijing.
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Taiwan says China and the WHO have conspired for political purposes to lock it out of key meetings, that the WHO has not responded to its requests for coronavirus information and that the WHO has previously misreported Taiwan’s virus case numbers.
The WHO and China strongly dispute this, saying Taiwan has been given all the help it needs, but that only China has the right to represent the island in the WHO.
READ: WHO says it has ‘no mandate’ to invite Taiwan to assembly meeting
In a report released on Tuesday, the US Congress’ US-China Economic and Security Review Commission said Taiwan’s exclusion contributed to “critical delays” in timely receipt and accurate guidance for WHO members in the early stages of the outbreak.
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“Had the WHO allowed Taiwan’s health experts to share information and best practices in early January, governments around the world could have had more complete information on which to base their public health policies,” it said.
One of Taiwan’s main complaints is that the WHO ignored its request for information in late December on the potential for human-to-human transmission. The WHO has said Taiwan’s email it received made no mention of human-to-human transmission.
READ: New Zealand sticks with support for Taiwan at WHO despite Chinese rebuke
China confirmed virus transmission between people on Jan 20. On Jan 12, the WHO had said there was no clear evidence of such transmission.
“In this respect, the WHO’s suppression of information provided by Taiwan and the delayed issuance of its own guidance undermined the national security of the very member states trusting it for authoritative public health guidance,” the US commission said.
“The lives lost as a result of these missteps offer a tragic reminder of how global health is compromised by the WHO’s politically motivated exclusion of Taiwan,” it added.
Taiwan, with the strong backing of the United States and some of its major allies, is lobbying to be allowed access as an observer to next week’s meeting of the WHO’s decision-making body, the World Health Assembly.
But China says it won’t support this and the WHO says it has no mandate on its own to invite Taiwan.
Taiwan has reported only 440 coronavirus cases and seven deaths, far lower than many of its neighbors, thanks to early and effective prevention work and its first rate health system.
