WHO team member: 'Don't rely' on US virus intelligence

A team member who was part of the World Health Organization's mission to China hit out at the United States on Wednesday after US officials had criticized the WHO's probe.

Zoologist Peter Daszak was part of the special mission sent to the city of Wuhan to investigate the source of the coronavirus pandemic.

In remarks posted to Twitter, Daszak said US President Joe Biden "has to look tough on China."

He added: "Please don't rely too much on US intel: increasingly disengaged under Trump and frankly wrong on many aspects."

Daszak's comments on Twitter linked to an article on US State Department comments that cast doubt on the transparency of China's cooperation with the WHO mission.

Coronavirus diplomacy

The WHO experts walked a diplomatic tightrope while carrying out their probe in Wuhan.

Former US President Donald Trump frequently laid the blame on China for the virus. He repeated a controversial theory that the virus may have escaped from a laboratory in Wuhan — the WHO team concluded this was "extremely unlikely."

Before the international team headed to China, the country warned against the politicization of the issue.

There was a further diplomatic row after the WHO had said that two of their experts had initially been denied entry to China in early January 2021 ahead of the probe.

There had also been widespread concerns about the scientists' access to data a year on from the outbreak, and amid accusations that Beijing downplayed the initial severity of the coronavirus crisis.

What did the WHO team uncover in Wuhan?

The WHO mission to China ended without finding the source of the coronavirus, experts said at a press briefing on Tuesday.

But the team's probe introduced new avenues of inquiry, including those proposed by China that it may have originated overseas or been spread by frozen foods.

The team of foreign experts did agree that the virus likely jumped from bats to an unknown animal species before transmitting to humans.

This report was written in part with material from Agence France-Presse (AFP).