The Director-General of World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in a media briefing in Geneva, said the agency “can only give advice, but one thing should be clear, we don’t have any mandate to force countries to implement what we advise them.”
It’s up to the countries to take our advice, or reject it”, adding that the agency gives advice based on “the best science and evidence.”
He said, “On January 30, we declared the highest level of global emergency on COVID19. During that time there were only 82 cases outside China. No cases in Latin America, actually. No cases in Africa. Only 10 cases in Europe.”
“The world should have listened to WHO then, carefully,” Tedros said. “Every country could have triggered all its public health measures possible.”
At the time, the WHO advised the world to find, test, isolate, and contract trace for each case. Tedros said, “You can check for yourselves, countries who followed that are in a better position than others. This is a fact. At the end of the day, each country takes its own responsibility.”
