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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called Wednesday for structural changes to the World Health Organization (WHO) and greater transparency from China over the origins of the coronavirus.
“Even today, the Chinese government hasn’t permitted American scientists to go into China, to go into not only the Wuhan lab but wherever it needs to go to learn about this virus, to learn about its origins,” Pompeo told “The Ingraham Angle”. “Look, we know it began at one [lab], but we need to figure this out. There’s an ongoing pandemic. We still don’t have the transparency and openness we need in China.”
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Pompeo then criticized the WHO for not helping the U.S. gather crucial data from China.
“It is the World Health Organization’s responsibility to achieve that transparency. They’re not doing it. They need to be held accountable,” Pompeo said. “And what’s been great is to see other countries around the world to begin to recognize the WHO failures as well.”
President Trump announced at a coronavirus task force briefing last week that the United States will immediately halt all funding for the WHO, saying the global health agency had put “political correctness over lifesaving measures.”
Ingraham asked Pompeo whether he was “ruling out” that WHO leader Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus should step down as a requirement for the U.S. to renew their relationship with the organization.
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“No, I think that’s right,” Pompeo said. “Or even more than that. It may be the case that the United States can never return to underwriting, having U.S. taxpayer dollars go to the WHO. We may need to be have even bolder change than that.”
Fox News’ Gregg Re contributed to this report.
