WHO investigation team heading to Wuhan airport in China▶ Click here to enlarge
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The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) said that China has refused to provide raw data (raw data) and customized data on early outbreak cases to the World Health Organization (WHO) investigation team trying to find the origin of the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19). Reported on the day (local time).
The data can help determine when and how Corona 19 first began to spread in China, the newspaper said.
According to reports, Chinese authorities declined a request from WHO experts to provide detailed data on 174 confirmed cases in Wuhan in December 2019, in the early stages of the outbreak of Corona 19.
Instead, Chinese government officials and scientists provided only their own analysis and extensive summaries of the cases, WHO investigators said.
However, the investigation team revealed that they could not access raw data for retrospective studies, a method of epidemiological investigations that look at cases from the past. These studies explained that it is a way to self-analyze how early and how widespread Corona 19 spread in China.
WSJ evaluated that China’s reluctance to provide such data raises concerns in the international community about China’s lack of transparency in the process of finding the origin of the Corona 19 pandemic.
Since the WHO has no authority to force member states to provide data, the investigation was forced to rely on cooperation from the Chinese authorities.
Thea Fisher, a member of the investigation team, said there were no contradictions in the data that could be accessed in Wuhan, but that the in-depth analysis could not be performed because of the lack of raw data, and “sometimes sentiment was intensified” with the Chinese side.
WSJ also cited the WHO investigation team on the 10th and reported that 92 people were hospitalized in Hubei Province in October 2019, two months before the official initial outbreak, with symptoms similar to Corona 19.
In this regard, the WHO investigative team said, “Additional research is needed,” and requested a broader serum test of blood samples collected in Hubei Province in the fall of 2019, but the Chinese responded that’it has not yet been approved’, the newspaper said.
WHO International Expert Team (CG) Investigating the Origin of Corona 19 in Wuhan, China–
In response, an expert who was involved in the investigation of the origin of Corona 19 said the WHO wanted to find out if there were any small outbreaks before the first case was reported in Wuhan.
Dutch-born virologist Marion Coffmans said at a WHO video briefing on the 12th that a review of Chinese disease statistics revealed that there were 92 patients before the first case was reported at the end of 2019, the dpa news agency reported.
He suspected that no antibodies were observed in their recent blood tests, but this may be due to the passage of time.
He said that the answer will be from samples stored at the Chinese blood bank in 2019, and “debate is underway in China to make it accessible.”
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