Dispatch of COVID-19 Animal Source Experts to China Will Take Weeks - WHO's Ryan

GENEVA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 17th July, 2020) A full-fledged World Health Organization (WHO) team of experts to identify animal source of COVID-19 will not be dispatched to China until August, WHO Health Emergencies Programme Executive Director Michael Ryan said at a briefing in Geneva.

"I think at this point it's unrealistic, given the timelines and given the logistics, that we would expect a full mission to be going to the field in July, just in terms of the timing and in terms of pulling that team together. This is going to be a multinational team with many experts from a number of different countries, with a number of different expertise.

Bringing that team together and then bringing that team into China to work with Chinese colleagues is going to take � just from purely logistics and health risk management perspectives � weeks, not days," he said.

According to him, the WHO representatives, who are now in China, are pleased with the interaction with their Chinese colleagues, and are awaiting the completion of work on a general plan of action.