World Health Organization chief said yesterday that the WHO advance team that traveled to China has concluded their mission to lay the groundwork for further joint efforts to identify the virus origins.
“One of the areas that we’ve been continuing to study is the origins of the virus that causes COVID-19,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual press conference from Geneva.
As a result of these efforts, he said that WHO and Chinese experts have drafted the Terms of Reference for the studies and program of work for an international team, led by WHO.
“The international team will include leading scientists and researchers from China and around the world,” the WHO chief said.
Epidemiological studies will begin in China’s Wuhan to identify the potential source of infection of the early cases, he said, adding that evidence and hypotheses generated through this work will lay the ground for further, longer-term studies.
An advance team, comprised of two WHO experts, was sent to China about three weeks ago. They have not yet returned to the WHO’s Geneva headquarters for a debriefing.
Meanwhile, the WHO warned that there might never be a “silver bullet” for COVID-19 in the form of a perfect vaccine and that the road to normality would be long, with some countries requiring a reset of strategy.
More than 18.14 million people around the world have been infected and 688,080 have died, according to a Reuters tally, with some nations that thought they were over the worst experiencing a resurgence.
“A number of vaccines are now in phase three clinical trials and we all hope to have a number of effective vaccines that can help prevent people from infection. However, there’s no silver bullet at the moment — and there might never be.
“For now, stopping outbreaks comes down to the basics of public health and disease control.”
The WHO head said that, while the coronavirus was the biggest health emergency since the early 20th century, the international scramble for a vaccine was also “unprecedented.”
But he underscored uncertainties. “There are concerns that we may not have a vaccine that may work, or its protection could be for just a few months, not more. But until we finish the clinical trials, we will not know.”
WHO emergencies head Mike Ryan said countries with high transmission rates, including Brazil and India, needed to brace for a big battle: “The way out is long and requires a sustained commitment.”
“Some countries are really going to have to take a step back now and really take a look at how they are addressing the pandemic within their national borders,” he added.
(Agencies)