Dr. Anthony Fauci contended that Chinese officials had needed to be more transparent with coronavirus information at the beginning of the outbreak.
"I think the Chinese authorities that did not allow the scientists to speak out as openly and transparently as they could have really did a disservice," the infectious diseases expert said on John Catsimatidis' radio show on Sunday.
The first documented case of COVID-19 occurred in Wuhan, China, late last year.
Fauci said Sunday that there was a period of time where important information wasn't being shared "in a timely fashion."
He said authorities in China maintained for too long early on that the transmission of the virus was from animal-to-human, and that there was "wasn't really any human-to-human transmission at all."
"They held that line for a few weeks," Fauci said. "And then it became very clear when the scientists were able to talk about it that, in fact, there was human-to-human transmission that was really very efficient."
There have been more than 6 million cases of the novel coronavirus worldwide, and more than 400,000 deaths.
Fauci's comments come days after the Associated Press reported that the slow release of information regarding COVID-19 by Chinese authorities early on privately frustrated officials within the World Health Organization.
