Could Trump Be Right This Time? World Health Organisation's Early Reports Could Be Misleading

The heated debate, between US President Donald Trump and the World Health Organization regarding early reports on the novel coronavirus, has only been getting more controversial.

While Trump continues to accuse the WHO and Chinese authorities of hiding the truth; related to how COVID-19 is transmitted and the actual numbers of people infected, the World Health Organization insists that his statements are only made to justify the devastating spike of coronavirus cases and deaths in the United States.

Social media users have been looking for online evidence to examine both reactions and to decide on whether the WHO is a reliable source when it comes to COVID-19 information, especially after the US President has threatened to cut financial funding for the international organization.

In a Twitter post last January, the WHO cited "preliminary" investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities as proof that the coronavirus "can't be transmitted by human contact."

Yet after taking time to respond to the December 2019, Chinese reports of a new acute respiratory disease which "has never been identified by humans before," the World Health Organization became subject to accusations of  acting too late on the global level, and thus causing the wide-spread of the disease.

Some online users went on to accuse the international organization of covering up the truth of the deadly virus, which first generated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, and providing "misleading" information to the rest of the world, until it was too late for governments to control or contain the virus.

Additionally, China is facing lots of rising questions regarding the real death toll resulting from the viral outbreak, despite local reports of life "getting back to normal" in most Chinese regions and health officials reporting no new cases for the last few weeks.

Responding to Trump's accusations, many social media users pointed out that he too had made several statements downplaying the dangers of the coronavirus, even after it devastated European countries like Italy and Spain last month, suggesting that his administration has been acting late as well.

The novel coronavirus continues to wreak havoc across the world, with the US and Europe paying the highest price in terms of human victims.

The international death toll of COVID-19 nears 90k victims with more than 1.5 million cases worldwide.