WHO Director Thanks Multiple World Leaders for Support on World Health Day After Trump Threatens to Freeze U.S. Funding

https://www.newsweek.com/who-funding-world-health-day-1496782

Trump—who has been widely criticized for initially dismissing the threat of the novel coronavirus and failing to formulate a coherent federal response—said Tuesday that the WHO "really blew it." The president claims that the body was too slow to identify the threat of the outbreak in China, where government officials sought to hide the growing problem.

The WHO raised the alarm early on in the crisis, declaring a "public health emergency of international concern" at the end of January, one day before Health Secretary Alex Azar announced a public health emergency, and weeks before Trump declared a national emergency. Almost a month later, the president claimed on Twitter, "The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA."

The president's main issue with the WHO appeared to be that it did not support his ban on some travel from China, introduced at the end of January. At the time, the WHO warned that such methods are usually not effective in containing pandemics, and that such a decision could divert attention and resources from more important efforts.

The president later appeared to walk back his funding threat. Responding to a reporter's question as to whether he would pull support for the body, the president replied, "I'm not saying that I'm going to do it. But we're going to look at it."

When he was told he had just said that funding would be withheld, the president falsely claimed, "No, I didn't. I said we're going to look at it."