“Knowing how this pandemic started is very, very important and very crucial,” said the WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Yet, reports suggest that the organization responsible for international public health has had to drop the second phase of the investigation.
Dr. Tedros was responding to queries based on an article published on the Nature website, which claimed that the WHO had “quietly shelved the second phase of its much-anticipated scientific investigation into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
While the scientific community expressed its dismay, not many were surprised. The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic broke out in China in late 2019. Official records put the death toll at 6,842,462, and the total reported cases at 756,411,740. The losses incurred by various countries related to trade and commerce are still being assessed. Some estimates suggest that the impact of the pandemic on the tourism sector has resulted in a loss of $4 trillion.
Despite the staggering numbers and irrecoverable losses, Beijing has focused on shirking blame and obstructing attempts to conduct a thorough scientific investigation into how the Covid -19 pandemic broke out. The scientific community has strongly vouched for a detailed study into the origin and spread of SARS-CoV-2 to prevent future outbreaks.
But, little can be done without access to the outbreak’s epicenter, considered Wuhan, in China. A year after the outbreak, in January 2021, a team of experts assembled by the WHO visited the city where the virus was first detected. They suggested possible scenarios. The most probable was that the virus spread from bats to people, and most likely through an intermediate species. The unsubstantiated “accidental lab leak” theory, which got much media attention, was thought to be “extremely unlikely.” These were just preliminary findings, and the team left hoping to return to conduct an in-depth phase two study.
As the pandemic spread, bringing life to a standstill in most places worldwide, China found itself on the back foot. What should have been the subject of scientific investigation and research soon deteriorated into a political blame game. President Trump’s attempts to name the pathogen “China virus” and digs like “Kung flu” only made matters worse.
Even in the best of circumstances, it is unlikely that Beijing would have been fully cooperative or transparent with international investigators and scientists. But, with ego clashes and national pride at stake, China saw every attempt as one to pin blame rather than conduct a factual, methodical study.
Beijing was unhappy with the proposal to study possible lab breaches in the second phase. Matters seem to have come to a head. Maria Van Kerkhove, an epidemiologist at the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, told Nature, “There is no phase two.” It is safe to say that all parties could have handled the crisis better.
Without full-fledged site access, efforts to study the virus may remain incomplete. Studies were proposed to narrow the list of animals susceptible to the virus and could act as hosts. Bats in the region of the first outbreak could have revealed valuable information. Blood and water samples from the area may have held some clues. But, with each passing day, such information becomes more difficult to gather.
It is not only the international community the autocratic government is hiding from. According to official data, China’s Covid-19 death toll stands at 83,150. But, epidemiologists suggest that a “realistic tally” could be between 1 million to 1.5 million deaths.
Denied access to the pandemic outbreak epicenter, the world must do what it can to prevent future similar crises. The WHO formed the Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens (SAGO) in November 2021. Its primary function is “to systematically study the emergence of future emerging pathogens with pandemic potential.” The experts have put in place a proposal on “how to conduct origins studies for future outbreaks.”
For now, China’s economic clout and autocratic defiance seem to have thwarted the WHO’s efforts. Unless international pressure is put on Beijing, it is unlikely that we will ever know how a pandemic that claimed millions of lives originated.
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Republished with permission from TIPP Insights
