Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), speaks to the media after the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee on Ebola in Congo, in Geneva, Switzerland, Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2018. The World Health Organization says it is “deeply concerned” by the ongoing Ebola outbreak in Congo but the situation does not yet warrant being declared a global emergency. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

Republicans are demanding answers from WHO about their relationship with China.

Republicans on the House Oversight Committee sent WHO a letter asking them to explain their actions in regards to China and the Wuhan coronavirus. In the letter, they expressed concern that WHO had placed the interests of China over informing the world, as is their mission, indicating they “helped Beijing disseminate propaganda, downplayed the extent of the disease, and possibly delayed ordering a public health emergency.”

They pointed to three actions by WHO that contributed to the pandemic:

1. Denied human-to-human spread of COVID-19 based solely on Chinese propaganda. They ignored the warning from Taiwan that it was communicable, apparently because of not wanting to offend China.

2. Prolonged naming COVID-19 a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) and pandemic because China had the spread under control.

3. Delayed serious measures, like travel restrictions, to counter the global spread. President Donald Trump actually cut travel on Jan. 31, while WHO was still saying it wasn’t necessary to do so, even though they knew at that point it was communicable. From Dec. 31 to Jan. 31, the letter notes, 430,000 flew from China to the U.S.

Despite China’s cover-up, WHO has said nothing about China’s actions or lies to them.

“Throughout the crisis, the WHO has shied away from placing any blame on the Chinese government, which is in essence the Communist Party of China. You, as leader of the WHO, even went so far as to praise the Chinese government’s “transparency” during the crisis, when, in fact, the regime has consistently lied to the world by underreporting their actual infection and death statistics.”

According to the Daily Caller, Rep. Jody Hice (R-GA) said, “The World Health Organization has become party to China’s coronavirus misinformation and propaganda campaign. Whether it’s deliberate or not, we don’t yet know. This ‘apolitical’ organization praised the communist regime’s ‘transparency,’ spent weeks pushing the claim that there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission of the virus, and even resisted President Trump’s early travel restrictions on China.” Hice said as oversight, they had a responsibility to demand reforms.

Rep Mike McCaul took it a step further.

“There is a case to be made here that this is the worst cover-up in human history,” McCaul said to Fox News in an interview. “This is a cover-up by the Chinese Communist Party, which has now led to one of the worst pandemics we’ve ever seen.” “The World Health Organization did not protect the world from this pandemic and I consider them to be co-conspirators with the Chinese Communist Party,” McCaul continued. He also called for the resignation of WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

China has used WHO’s pronouncements praising them to deflect blame over the pandemic. As we previously reported, a study by the University of Southampton said that the impact across the world could have been “reduced by 95 percent globally,” if China acted three weeks earlier.

President Donald Trump called out WHO earlier in the week and indicated that they would be looking at pulling their funding. On Friday, he indicated that the might have an announcement coming next week in regard to WHO.

From Washington Examiner:

“We are going to have an announcement on the World Health Organization sometime next week,” the president said at the White House coronavirus task force briefing on Friday afternoon. “As you know, we have given them approximately $500 million a year, and we are going to be talking about that subject next week. We’ll have a lot to say about it.” [….] Earlier this week, Trump said he is considering putting a “very powerful hold” on the “vast amounts” of funds the United States gives to the organization. The president also said the WHO “seemed very China-centric” and “really blew it” in its coronavirus response.

WHO presently has a $4.8 billion budget, which is a huge amount for toadying to China and failing the world.