After facing flak from partners, the Government has finally responded to an independent report on Covid-19 which ran into alleged roadblocks in China
New Zealand has raised belated concerns about a controversial World Health Organisation report into the origins of Covid-19, saying it shares “regrets” about limited access to early samples and data that could explain how the pandemic came about.
The Government faced criticism from some quarters after it opted against signing onto a joint letter from 14 other countries implicitly criticising a lack of transparency from China, where Covid-19 is believed to have originated.
When the signatories - including the four other members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance - released the statement in late March after the WHO released its report, New Zealand was a notable absentee, with Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta telling journalists the Government was awaiting scientific analysis before making any comment.
In a lengthy but unattributed statement quietly published on April 16, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) described the WHO study as “an important report, and a useful step in the work on the origins of Covid-19”.
“The report is valuable in highlighting areas where further technical work is required to make sure we can prepare better, as individual countries and as a global community, for any future pandemics.”
However, in a nod to the concerns of other countries as well as WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, MFAT said New Zealand “share[d] the regrets of others at the limitations around access to early samples and related data”.
New Zealand supported the WHO’s proposals for further work on the pandemic, and said research needed to tie in with “the ongoing and complementary work of the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response” co-chaired by former prime minister Helen Clark.
“We support WHO Director-General Tedros’s expectation that future collaborative studies include more timely and comprehensive data sharing.”
The statement said there were still many unanswered questions about how the virus was first introduced into the human population, but “regardless of how the initial spill over occurred, it is clear that ... human-to-human transfer has almost exclusively accounted for the global spread thereafter”.
New Zealand supported the WHO’s proposals for further work on the pandemic, and said research needed to tie in with “the ongoing and complementary work of the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response” co-chaired by former prime minister Helen Clark.
“Good connections between the two are critical to ensure that we most effectively learn from Covid-19 to better prevent or respond to the next pandemic.”
The language in New Zealand’s statement is less sharp than that from the joint letter from the 14 nations, which raised concerns about significant delays in the expert study and a lack of access to “complete, original data and samples”.
“Scientific missions like these should be able to do their work under conditions that produce independent and objective recommendations and findings.”
'Access, transparency and timeliness' needed
The group said the WHO and its members needed to show a renewed commitment to “access, transparency, and timeliness”, adding: “It is critical for independent experts to have full access to all pertinent human, animal, and environmental data, research, and personnel involved in the early stages of the outbreak relevant to determining how this pandemic emerged.”
Tedros himself, who has faced criticism from some nations for a perceived reluctance to criticise Beijing, acknowledged his investigative team had “expressed the difficulties they encountered in accessing raw data” during their visit to China in early 2021.
The report’s conclusion that a leak of the virus from a Wuhan laboratory was “extremely unlikely” was not based on a sufficiently extensive assessment, Tedros said, with further investigation needed.
In the wake of New Zealand’s decision to abstain from signing the joint statement, right-wing newspaper The Australian suggested the country was “shutting its eyes to appease China” while the political editor of conservative British outlet The Spectator criticised “a shocking lack of solidarity from New Zealand”.
The push for a WHO probe last year itself created diplomatic friction, with China imposing hefty tariffs and restrictions on Australian wine, beef and barley after the country led the calls for an independent inquiry (Beijing has insisted its decisions were not based on political tensions).
