[taneq]

> Unless I am mistaken, NZ did not ask (=require) the general public to wear masks because the NZ government was primarily following information disseminated through the WHO as guidance.

That is my understanding also. And now the WHO has (after many months of proclaiming masks as useless) turned around and started advocating for them. The WHO also denied that COVID-19 was a pandemic far beyond the point where it was clearly exploding in many regions, while insisting that all airline flights should continue as normal, and probably contributed significantly to the speed and scale of the global pandemic by doing so.

I wouldn't place any credence in old WHO statements regarding this virus (or, honestly, in anything the WHO says after their performance here).