Given the WHO’s praise of China and condemnation of other countries I thought it might be interesting to take a look historically at the WHO.
WHO Controversies
- West Nile Experiments: A field experiment in the West Nile district allowed researchers to take blood from children 3 times a day, in order to allegedly study an local disease causing mononucleosis. It has been alleged they were actually being infected with contaminated polio vaccines and their antibodies were being studied. Around 45,000 were tested from 1960-1973.
- Ebola and HIV Experimentation: It has been alleged that the WHO was aware of a Dr. Hilary Koprowski, a doctor allegedly performing research on AIDS and Ebola by deceiving and infecting Africans with a faux polio vaccine. It was estimated that over a million Africans were infected from 1954-1957. However, his work having been the cause of any disease has been refuted.
- 2013–2016 Ebola outbreak: Following the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the organization was heavily criticized for its bureaucracy, insufficient financing, regional structure, and staffing profile.
- International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) controversies: The World Health Organization sub-department, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), has been criticized for the way it analyses the tendency of certain substances and activities to cause cancer and for having a politically motivated bias when it selects studies for its analysis. Ed Yong, a British science journalist, has criticized the agency and its “confusing” category system for misleading the public. Marcel Kuntz, a French director of research at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, criticized the agency for its classification of potentially carcinogenic substances. He claimed that this classification did not take into account the extent of exposure: for example, red meat is qualified as probably carcinogenic, but the quantity of consumed red meat at which it could become dangerous is not specified.[147]
- IARC Cell Phones: Controversies have erupted multiple times when the IARC has classified many things as Class 2a (probable carcinogens) or 2b (possible carcinogen), including cell phone signals, glyphosate, drinking hot beverages, and working as a barber.
- Robert Mugabe’s role as a goodwill ambassador: On 21 October 2017, the Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus appointed former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe as a WHO Goodwill Ambassador to help promote the fight against non-communicable diseases. The appointment address praised Mugabe for his commitment to public health in Zimbabwe. The appointment attracted widespread condemnation and criticism in WHO member states and international organizations due to Robert Mugabe’s poor record on human rights and presiding over a decline in Zimbabwe’s public health. Due to the outcry, the following day the appointment was revoked.
I compiled the above list from Wikipedia. There were more, but those looked like the most serious charges.
Looks Like a Pandemic
But hey, the WHO officials say it isn’t.
Moreover, the WHO has praised China’s strong quarantine approach and allegedly honest reporting while condemning the US and other countries for banning flights.
The WHO is a SPOS. The first “S” stands for sorry. You can work out the rest.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
By the way, with the cruise ship–and with any quarantine–do they let everyone go 14 days after the initiation of the quarantine or 14 days after the last case is revealed?
And if it is 14 days after the last case, what do you do about asymptomatic carriers (lung or intestinal)? How do you rule it out?
Call it the infinity cruise…with a 10 little Indians theme.
LOL! “Call it the infinity cruise…with a 10 little Indians theme.” – good one. From Here to Eternity with the A. Christie reference too, ‘who did it’? As for the infection rate when not quarantined, the latest news (as of Feb 8) is “3,711 on the ship quarantined, 273 tested, 61 now confirmed infected”; do the math: 61/273 = 22%. So 22% of people will get 2019-nCoV if confined to close quarters?
…An additional 10 people aboard the now-quarantined Diamond Princess cruise liner have tested positive for the coronavirus, bringing the current total to 20….
If this spreads via same mechanism as norovirus (fecal/oral) and coughs and sneezes, this could be long-term trouble
34 year old doctor who first raised a warning about Corona virus dies of Cornavirus.
Are you young-uns still feeling good about the “old, feeble death demographic”?
A report I read showed that 80% of the dead are over 60, but obviously not all of them are.
Had he been on holiday sitting on his bum playing Scrabble and gotten the virus, he no doubt would have survived the virus just fine. As an overworked doctor working 20 hours a day, his compromised system undoubtedly had a hard time fighting it off. While old age and gender may be a huge factor, mitigating factors also play into the equation.
Extrapolating from ground zero, and from a massively exposed doctor in particular, to infected populations further out, is just plain guesswork. Heck, it’s worse than guesswork.
That even in central Wuhan, the source of the outbreak, far and away most people dying, are from presumed “weaker” cohorts, is a darned good sign for anyone further away.
As is the sheer concentration of deaths in the immediate outbreak area, in comparison to further out.
It’s still early enough in the outbreak that this could partially be because “healthier” cohorts just take longer dying. But one way or the other, even at the outbreak site, this looks to be far from the most severely symptomatic virus around.
Via ZH, it deserves reprinting:
Dr. Li, 34, was hospitalized on January 12 after contracted the virus from his patient, and he was confirmed to have the coronavirus on February 1, and The World Health organization has just confirmed his passing.
As a reminder, Li Wenliang – who warned the public of a potential “SARS-like” disease in December 2019 – was questioned by local health authority, and warned:
“We solemnly warn you: If you keep being stubborn, with such impertinence, and continue this illegal activity, you will be brought to justice – is that understood?”
Dr, Li was later summoned by Wuhan police to sign a reprimand letter in which he was accused of “spreading rumors online” and “severely disrupting social order.”
In the meantime, local authorities had apologized to him but that apology came too late, and now with 10s of millions of Chinese locked down under martial law, Wenliang was proven very much right.
And all you guys with your speculation on the demographics of the dead is based on…?
Where is there an official report on the demographics?
There is a lot we don’t know.
Yes, but other than that one unfortunate incident, were you pleased with security at the theatre, Mrs. Lincoln?
Found this quote in an article on the Spanish Flu: “Truth and falsehood are arbitrary terms….The force of an idea lies in its inspirational value. It matters very little if it is true or false.” It is credited to an advisor to Woodrow Wilson, and led to the creation of the Committee on Public Information. The article goes on to the inevitable end of such a policy. “In most disasters, people come together, help each other… But in 1918… without the truth, trust evaporated. And people looked after only themselves.”
Trust didn’t just magically evaporate overnight one day in 1918. Instead, it had been evaporating over the preceding decades.
From the beginning of the progressive era.
And for good reasons. Humans are rational beings. Putting any trust whatsoever in newspeaking progressives, is plain irrational.
Just change the name to CCPWHO , and all is well and truthful.
The WHO is no doubt idiotic, and their recommendation not to ban travel was exceptionally poor, but the CDC has done a fantastic job of quarantining people and preventing the spread in the US.
So far….bit early to make that call…
The CDC was slow. Hopefully, not too slow.
Clearly you haven’t seen Walking Dead. CDC sure botched it there.
Politicians and other “rulers”, and their direct appointees, are always idiots. Pretty much a universal truism. Being in the spotlight, feigning importance and living high off of other people’s confiscated earnings, are what they do. But at the same time, at least the WHO ones aren’t really doing all that much. Recommending travel bans from San Diego to Tijuana, because some dudes are dying in Boston, isn’t really the epitome of medical enlightenment. Besides, the only ones paying attention to the front figures, are other, national level politicians, who aren’t really doing much themselves, but are mainly looking for someone to hide behind should things get bad..
Deeper into the meat of the organization, the WHO does serve a useful purpose. Not necessarily for huge countries like China and the US, with far reaching CDCs of their own and massive resources in every conceivable area. But for smaller, especially poorer, countries, the WHO does provide both communication channels and coordination, specialized knowledge, coordination and resources, for those who actually are doing something other than posturing for the cameras.