The World Health Organization (WHO) is a leading organisation involved in the global coordination for mitigating the COVID-19 pandemic within the broader United Nations response to the pandemic. On 5 January 2020, the WHO notified the world about a "pneumonia of unknown cause" in China and subsequently began investigating the disease. On 20 January, the WHO confirmed human-to-human transmission of the disease. On 30 January, the WHO declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and warned all countries. On 11 March, the WHO said the outbreak constituted a pandemic. By 5 October of the same year, the WHO estimated that a tenth of the world's population had been infected with the novel virus. The WHO has spearheaded several initiatives, such as the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund, to raise money for the pandemic response, the UN COVID-19 Supply Chain Task Force, and the solidarity trial for investigating potential treatment options for the disease. The COVAX program, co-led by the WHO, Gavi, and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), aims to accelerate the development and manufacture of COVID-19 vaccines and to guarantee fair and equitable access for every country in the world. The WHO's handling of the initial outbreak required a "diplomatic balancing act" between member states, in particular between the United States and China. On 27 August 2020, WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced that an independent expert committee would be established to examine various aspects of the international treaty that governs preparedness and response to health emergencies. A WHO-led international mission arrived in China in January 2021 to investigate the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, and released preliminary findings the following month.
Background The World Health Organization has provided state-endorsed guidance and has set norms and standards on outbreak preparedness and responses. This was by its role of providing guidance and assisting with coordination in controlling the international spread of diseases. However, the WHO does not have the power to legally enforce its recommendations.
Timeline
December 2019 On 30 December 2019, the WHO obtained a Chinese report about seven or more cases of atypical pneumonia. On 31 December 2019, authorities in China reported a cluster of cases of pneumonia of unknown cause. Taiwan's CDC emailed the WHO a few hours later, restating the earlier Chinese report and requesting more information.
January 2020 On 1 January 2020, the WHO set up the Incident Management Support Team for dealing with the disease outbreak on an emergency basis. On 5 January 2020, the WHO notified all member states about the new outbreak of an unknown pneumonia virus in the Hubei province of China. On 10 January, the WHO issued a comprehensive package of guidance to countries on how to test for potential cases. By this date, the WHO warned of the risk of human-to-human transmission. On 12 January, Chinese scientists shared the genetic sequence of the new virus, and the WHO asked a German team to design a test. On 13 January, the WHO confirmed the first case of the disease outside of China, in Thailand. On 14 January, Maria Van Kerkhove, an American infectious disease epidemiologist of the WHO, told in a press briefing that "it is possible that there is limited human-to-human transmission, potentially among families, but it is very clear right now that we have no sustained human-to-human transmission" WHO recommended countries to take precautions due to the precedent of human-to-human transmission set during earlier SARS and MERS outbreaks. On the same day, the WHO's Twitter account stated that "preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission". On 20 January, the WHO tweeted that it was "now very clear from the latest information that there is at least some human-to-human transmission" that has occurred, given that healthcare workers had been infected. On 22 January, the WHO issued a statement disclosing that the data "suggests that human-to-human transmission is taking place in Wuhan", and called for more investigation. On 22 January, an emergency committee was convened to assess whether the outbreak constituted a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). The committee could not reach a consensus. On 27 January, the WHO assessed the risk of the outbreak to be "high at the global level". On 30 January, the emergency committee reconvened and advised that the outbreak constituted a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. WHO warned that "all countries should be prepared for containment".
February 2020 On 3 February, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said there was no need to "unnecessarily interfere with international travel and trade" in trying to control COVID-19. He said, "We call on all countries to implement decisions that are evidence-based and consistent." At the time, China was "facing increasing international isolation due to restrictions on flights to and from the country, and bans on travellers from China". WHO's long-standing policy was that travel restrictions are generally ineffective and can be counter-productive. On 12 February, a Research and Innovation Forum was convened by the WHO, which included researchers and funders, to fund priority research for stopping the outbreak and preventing future outbreaks. From 16 to 24 February, the WHO–China Joint Mission travelled to China and created a report about the evolution of the outbreak in China.
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