China has agreed to allow a team of World Health Organization experts to enter the country to investigate the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, days after the United Nations agency’s top official criticized Beijing for holding up the mission. The state news agency, quoting China’s National Health Commission said on Monday that expert team from the WHO will conduct a field visit to China on this coming Thursday.
The WHO experts are scheduled to start their mission on Thursday and will be working with Chinese scientists in studying the contagion’s origins, China’s National Health Commission said in a brief statement on Monday. A health commission official earlier said the WHO team would be traveling to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus was first detected and which became the first Covid-19 hot spot. There is no announcement as of now on the itinerary of the visiting team, nor is there any confirmation on the quarantine requirements. It has been more than a year since first official case of novel Corona virus was announced in central Chinese city of Wuhan. The much-awaited confirmation came after WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who is often accused of being pro-China, in a rare rebuke, had expressed disappointment last week over Beijing not granting the necessary permissions for the expert team’s arrival.
