They did, however, say that there was "no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission". That claim in GP's post is at least partially accurate if disingenuous for argument's sake (I would counter that "no clear evidence" is a much less strong claim than "no evidence".)
"Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus"
There is a world of difference between "no human to human transmission" as you claim they said and "no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission" as they actually said.
- There is no evidence that P
- There is evidence that NOT-P
(without accounting for whether higher order evidence [evidence of evidence] counts as first-order evidence).
Or say I have a jug containing marbles. I tell you there are either ninety-nine yellow marbles and one blue or one hundred yellow marbles. I'll draw 10 marbles and you pick "no blue" or "no clear evidence of blue" as your statement. If you're wrong, you owe $1M to charity. I've drawn 10 yellow. Which statement do you pick?
No evidence that Person A is the murderer does not mean there is evidence that he is not the murderer(e.g. alibi). Evidence may turn up later on that he was indeed the murderer.
WHO said that there was no evidence of human to human transmission. They did not say they found evidence that it is not transmissible from human to human. That's a world of difference.
Now I don't particularly care whether they want to list Taiwan or not, but the only reason for that decision (when they are listing places like the Holy See!) is because they are moderating their position based on Chinese interests.
This is basically conversation ending evidence that the WHO is willing to act as a mouthpiece for Communist Party positions. That really should be it as far as YouTube's decision is concerned. The WHO are not an appropriate source for deciding what media people see. No body where the CPC is involved is. The CPC is not trustworthy; they can and will abuse the trust YouTube is placing in a body they have serious influence.
Expecting more from the WHO than you expect from the members who fund it seems insupportable.
It's disgraceful that WHO refused information requests from Taiwan and to see senior officials feigning deafness when questioned about Taiwan.
So they give dubious advice to the entire world since the good advice doesn't perfectly fit the world in entirety? There are many better options: don't give advice, explain two sets of advice, ask for advice from governments to be followed, make the advice generic enough that it still applies to the world.
An example of advice that might apply anywhere in the world:
"Face coverings will help to reduce transmission. In most parts of the world, masks will be in short supply and needed by health care workers much more than the general population. Masks can be made from any type of cloth. Although these may not have the same efficacy as high grade masks and the efficacy will be dependent upon the material used as well as the degree of seal against the face, these will help to reduce transmission."
This is one of those completely false things that people only believe is true by repetition. Go back and actually read the full set of WHO statements in mid-January. They have a bunch of statements saying that nations should get prepared, one saying that specific studies haven’t yet found hard evidence for person-to-person transmission (because at that point most of the cases they’d managed to find were tied to the market). The WHO never, ever said that it can’t be transmitted, and they absolutely never said that people should do nothing about COVID-19. They were urging nations to act for months before they actually did.
> 4. Masks don't work (but health workers need them!).
They don't say masks don't work either, they say that health workers need them more. Here you need to remember that the W stands for "World". They worry the most about the poorer countries who have much fewer masks available.