[simonh]

The WHO team was instrumental in getting the Chinese to report accurate infection rates, within 2 days of them arriving in country the reporting system was completely overhauled and they started reporting clinically diagnosed cases as well as positive tests at a time when testing capacity was minimal. This was a crucial contribution in illuminating the scale of the outbreak early on. Before that they, like everyone else, was almost entirely dependent on information from the Chinese government.

The WHO had developed a test kit, was distributing it and was helping countries ramp up production at a time when the US was making a complete mess of testing. Many third world countries are heavily dependent on WHO expertise and support. This move is a knife in their backs.

Honestly, who has the best track record of tackling this issue and taking it seriously. The WHO, or a man who was calling it a hoax 6 weeks after the WHO had alerted of possible international transmission?

[trobertson]

> Honestly, who has the best track record of tackling this issue and taking it seriously.

Taiwan, who the WHO regularly denies exists.

South Korea, whose success and strategies have been ignored.

This crisis has shown us the true face of the WHO: a primarily political organization with occasional work in medicine.

[simonh]

>South Korea, whose success and strategies have been ignored.

The WHO published summaries and support for the South Korean approach to the virus on 21 January, particularly highlighting their approach to testing and contact tracing and recommending similar approaches elsewhere. The WHO then started providing technical expertise to help countries set up testing and contact tracing systems, especially in poorer countries without that knowhow.

What was Trump doing, was he setting up a G20 summits to co-ordinate the global response like George Bush did during the financial crisis in 2008? Taking a role of global leadership? Nope, more than 5 weeks later while the WHO was leading efforts to track and contain the virus, Trump was still calling the whole thing a hoax at a mass rally in the US.

Trump can throw blame wherever he likes, you can pick nits in the activities of organisations that have been at the forefront of actually tackling this crisis. Whatever. But de-funding the WHO right now is a disgusting and reprehensible attack on the world's ability to tackle this crisis, from a country that was instrumental is setting up and running the WHO and it's predecessors for more than 100 years.