China rejects WHO plan to revisit Wuhan lab leak theory

China on Thursday categorically rejected the WHOrsquos plan for the second phase of coronavirus origintracing in Wuhan especially to probe the lab leak theory as it dismissed reports that some of the employees of the facility were infected with the deadly virus before it spread to the city and the worldChina will not follow the World Health Organisationrsquos suggested plan on the second phase of Covid19 origintracing Zeng Yixin vice minister of the National Health Commission NHC told a media briefing The work plan on the secondphase origins study proposed by the WHO contains language that does not respect science he said Chinarsquos broadside against the WHO and its Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus who previously won Beijingrsquos praise and support for praising President Xi Jinpingrsquos handling of the coronavirus came after he asked China to be transparent and provide raw dataZeng said the plan has listed the hypothesis that China had violated lab regulations and leaked the virus as one of the major research objectives and he was ldquovery shockedrdquo after reading the proposal staterun China Daily reported Instead nextphase origin tracing should focus on various regions and countries he said reiterating Beijingrsquos oftrepeated claim the coronavirus broke out in several places in the world and China was the first to report it in December 2019 when it emerged in Wuhan He said WHOrsquos work plan has been compromised by political manipulation and disrespect of scientific facts He said China had allowed WHO experts to visit all places they wanted and meet all people they wanted to early this year adding results of the WHOChina joint study are able to stand the test of time ldquoWe hope WHO can carefully consider the advice by Chinese scientists take investigating the origin of Covid19 virus as a scientific question free from political interference and proactively and properly conduct sustained investigations into origin of the virus in various countries across the worldrdquo he said Zeng dismissed reports three employees of Wuhan Institute of Virology from where the US alleges the virus may have been leaked fell sick shortly before first documented cases of Covid19Death rates soar in Southeast AsiaIndonesia has converted nearly its entire oxygen production to medical use just to meet the demand from Covid19 patients struggling to breathe Overflowing hospitals in Malaysia had to resort to treating patients on the floor And in Myanmarrsquos largest city graveyard workers have been laboring day and night to keep up with the grim demand for new cremations and burials In the last two weeks the three Southeast Asian nations have now all surpassed Indiarsquos peak per capita death rate as a new coronavirus wave fueled by the delta variant tightens its grip on the regionFrance now in fourth waveFrench Prime Minister Jean Castex confirmed on Wednesday the country is now in its fourth wave of Covid19 ldquoWe are in the fourth waverdquo Castex told TF1 news ldquoThe infamous Delta variant is here it is here it is the majority of cases and what characterises it from those that preceded it is that it is much more contagiousrdquo reported euronews Castex said 18181 new cases recorded in the 24 hours to Tuesday represented a 140 per cent jump from the previous week and claimed 96 per cent of these new infections were in unvaccinated people reported euronews404831No of new cases reported globally in the past 24 hours191148056Total no of cases worldwide4109303Total no of deaths worldwideSource WHOJohns HopkinsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever