health

How can we stop the next pandemic? Here's what a WHO panel recommends

15 Comments
By Stephanie Nebehay

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15 Comments
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Japan has not don't anything in this pandemic. Why talk about the next?

1 ( +5 / -4 )

Wasn’t this the role of WHO all along?:

“a global system set up for probing disease outbreaks, to deploy investigators at short-notice and reveal findings” -

Oh! Here’s the missing keyword: “transparent”.

“WHO's Emergency Committee should have declared an international health emergency at its first meeting on Jan 22 instead of waiting until Jan. 30.” -

5 ( +7 / -2 )

There is no WHO.

Not no more.

It's China Health Organization now.

2 ( +8 / -6 )

Wasn’t this the role of WHO all along?:

Theoretically yes, practically no.

There have been many problems of how the WHO coordinated the response against the pandemic, but some have been inevitable thanks to the efforts of many countries to debilitate the organization since more than 10 years ago.

Many people criticize the WHO for not openly criticizing China, but very few offer any alternatives, what would the WHO do to secure the Chinese cooperation? threaten with military action? sanctions? it has no such power, stop all collaborations with China? that would hurt the world much more so it would be counter-productive.

In reality the WHO did not criticize China because of the same reason it did not openly criticize anybody else (not the EU with the vaccine debacle, not the US with the defunding), it simply has no power to do it anymore.

This of course do not stops the same countries that took any leverage the WHO had from demanding it to use that leverage to do things, not a lot of sense there but as long as people have a scapegoat...

-2 ( +6 / -8 )

The WHO did and does have the power to speak out publicly to the world and the world listens.

They should've come out quickly and strongly denounced the cover up by the Chinese govt. from Nov 2019 when the very first mysterious cases popped up to when they persecuted the doctor who broke open the news on social media on Dec 31.

The WHO should now also strongly condemn the environment the Ch. gov. allows for the genesis of these viral epidemics with their torturous and cruel open live animal markets.

It's the responsibility of this world organization to dispense the best advice they can give with their collection of health experts. That's what they are there for.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

The WHO did and does have the power to speak out publicly to the world and the world listens.

Exactly! And WHO failed badly in that and continue to fail, and nobody resigned or took responsibility. This behavior strongly indicates corruption. WHO should be heavily reorganized.

5 ( +7 / -2 )

"Should be" and "should have" are the catchwords of failure. The most important thing is that they didn't do squat.

Suga's greatest success has been to make the infernal Olympics an egomaniacal success.

Suga's "Go to travel" and "Go to eat" probably helped to spread the pandemic.

Now that the Olympic crowd is safely housed and safely inoculated how about the rest of us who live in Japan?

That "should be" our government's prime agenda.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

It is not WHO’s role to criticize anyone or anything, but to provide information and to make reliable predictions and risk assessment. And if China is not trustworthy and known for its coverups in the past, it should be a factor in the analysis.

1 ( +3 / -2 )

And the following sentence from the article should be stressed:

"Chinese doctors reported cases of unusual pneumonia in December 2019 and informed authorities, while WHO picked up reports from the Taiwan Centers for Disease Control and others, the panel said."

To prevent the next pandemic, they should start by putting an end to all the viral gain of function research and to honestly investigate how SARSCoV2 emerged. What we are getting instead is complete silence on how Fauci funded the research in Wuhan via Daszak's EcoHealth Alliance.

A new transparent global system should be set up for probing disease outbreaks, empowering the World Health Organization to deploy investigators at short-notice and reveal findings...

Yes, but these investigators should be truly for discovering the truth and report on it honestly, rather than sending those who funneled the research funds (Daszak) to cover up instead of discovering.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

 but the next month was "lost" as countries failed to take strong measures to halt spread of the respiratory pathogen, it said.

although during that lost time Tedros WAS STILL saying that closing borders wasn't the answer.

My father worked his whole life for WHO. He said that after Dr Mahler retired and Nakajima took over it all went to hell in a handbasket.

And the result is Tedros, who is China's whipping boy. Disgusting.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

Does anyone really believe anything the WHO says? Next to China they’re the biggest liars in this whole mess

4 ( +6 / -2 )

We should all definitely blame both China and the WHO for this human tragedy which has caused the death of millions of innocent lives. No transparency and not one single resignation or sacking. Tedros and his cronies should be charged for CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY. This guy, Tedros, wants to stay for another term at the WHO. Laughable!

3 ( +5 / -2 )

“We totally screwed up this pandemic, but please give us more money and power! We promise to do better next pandemic!”

WHO sounds as tone deaf now as they were January a year ago.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

To prevent the next pandemic, they should start by putting an end to all the viral gain of function research and to honestly investigate how SARSCoV2 emerged. 

Imaginary conspiracies are not a good thing to base recommendations for, specially when you recommending stopping all pathogens research in the world, at this time no laboratory is not working with gain of function research for any of the multiple purposes it has. Not to mention that this kind of research is what allowed the development of safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19, only a deeply antiscientific person could think this is good advice.

At this point it the natural origin is the only realistic possibility for COVID-19, the artificial origin "explanations" are self contradictory and do not explain the evidence available.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

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