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The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday that a new working group could be the last chance to find the origins of covid-19.
The organization nominated 26 experts to join the team, the Scientific Advisory Group on the Origins of New Pathogens (SAGO).
More than a year and a half since the virus was detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the question of how it first arose remains unanswered.
The team will investigate whether the virus passed from animals to humans in Wuhan markets or was leaked in a laboratory accident.
China has strongly rejected the second theory.
In February, a WHO team tasked with investigating the origins of the covid traveled to China and concluded that the virus it probably arose from bats, but more research was needed.
Image source, Reuters
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director of the OMS.
But the director general of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, later said that the investigation had been hampered by a lack of data and transparency from China.
Prevent future outbreaks
The proposed members of the Sago group include six experts who visited China as part of the previous team.
Apart from the coronavirus, Sago also investigate the origins of other high-risk pathogens.
“Understanding where new pathogens are coming from is essential to preventing future outbreaks,” Tedros said.
In a joint publication in the magazine Science, Tedros and other WHO authorities said “a laboratory accident cannot be ruled out.”
Image source, Reuters
At a press conference on Wednesday, Michael Ryan, executive director of the WHO Health Emergencies Program, said it was impossible to ignore obstacles such as “national pride” that stand in the way of finding the origins of the coronavirus. .
And he added that the new group is “an effort to get back to scientific questions.”
“This is our best chance,” he said. “And it may be our last chance to learn about the origins of this virus in a collegial, collective and mutually responsible way.”
The announcement of the new group comes as news network CNN reported that China was preparing to analyze tens of thousands of blood bank samples taken in the first months of the pandemic.
But Chen Xu, China’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, said Sago’s work it should not be “politicized”.
“It is time to send teams to other places,” he said.
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Eddie is an Australian news reporter with over 9 years in the industry and has published on Forbes and tech crunch.