Judicial Watch: New Emails Detail WHO/NIH Accommodations to Chinese Confidentiality..

[IceWizard]

Judicial Watch:

New Emails Detail WHO/NIH Accommodations
to Chinese Confidentiality ‘Terms’



MARCH 01, 2021
|
JUDICIAL WATCH




(Washington, DC)

Judicial Watch announced today that it and the Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF)
received 301 pages of emails and other records of Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. H. Clifford Lane
from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services showing that National
Institutes of Health (NIH) officials tailored confidentiality forms to China’s terms and
that the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted an unreleased, “strictly confidential”
COVID-19 epidemiological analysis in January 2020.

Additionally, the emails reveal an independent journalist in China pointing out the inconsistent
COVID numbers in China to NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’
Deputy Director for Clinical Research and Special Projects Cliff Lane.

The emails were obtained in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed
in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by Judicial Watch on behalf of the DCNF
(Daily Caller News Foundation v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
(No. 1:20-cv-01149)).

The lawsuit was filed after HHS failed to respond to the DCNF’s April 1, 2020, FOIA request seeking:

01 Communications between Dr. Fauci and
Deputy Director Lane and World Health
Organization officials concerning the novel coronavirus.

02 Communications of Dr. Fauci and
Deputy Director Lane concerning WHO, WHO official
Bruce Aylward, WHO Director General Tedros Anhanom,
and China.


The new emails include a conversation about confidentiality forms on February 14-15, 2020, between
Lane and WHO Technical Officer Mansuk Daniel Han. Han writes: “The forms this time are
tailored to China’s terms so we cannot use the ones from before.”

A WHO briefing package sent on February 13, 2020, to NIH officials traveling to China as part
of the COVID response ask that the officials wait to share information until they have an
agreement with China:

“IMPORTANT: Please treat this as sensitive and not for public communications
until we have agreed communications with China.” 

In an email dated January 20, 2020, a WHO official discusses the epidemiological analysis they
conducted of COVID-19 earlier that month and states that it is “strictly confidential,” is “only for,”
the Strategic and Technical Advisory Group for Infection Hazards (STAG-IH), and “should not be
further disseminated.”

In an email dated March 4, 2020, from Chinese journalist Zeng Jia to Lane, a reporter for Caixin Media,
points out to Fauci deputy Cliff Lane that the number of cases reported in the WHO Joint China
Mission’s report are inconsistent with the number reported by the Wuhan Public Health Committee:

It says on Page 6 [in the WHO report] that there
was at least one clinically diagnosed case of coronavirus
on December 2th, 2019, in Wuhan; and from Jan 11th
to 17th there were new clinically diagnosed and
confirmed cases every day in Wuhan, which is not
consistent with Wuhan Public Health Committee’s
numbers.

In an email dated February 15, 2020, Gauden Galea, head of the WHO office in China, informs the joint
mission members traveling to China that all of their activities in China would be arranged by the
Chinese Government’s National Health Commission.

“These emails set the tone early on in the coronavirus outbreak. It’s clear that the WHO allowed
China to control the information flow from the start. True transparency is crucial,” said Ethan Barton,
editor-in chief for the Daily Caller News Foundation. 

“These new emails show WHO and Fauci’s NIH special accommodations to Chinese communist
efforts to control information about COVID-19,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

This is the latest information obtained in Judicial Watch and the DCNF’s ongoing investigation into
Fauci’s and NIH’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Judicial Watch and the DCNF previously
uncovered emails showing a WHO entity pushing for a press release, approved by Dr. Fauci,
“especially” supporting China’s COVID-19 response. 

On September 22, U.S. District Court Judge Dabney L. Friedrich ordered HHS to begin processing
responsive records. In a September 21 court filing, HHS said the agency could begin producing
300 pages of responsive records to the DCNF beginning on November 30, eight months after
receiving the Daily Caller’s FOIA request. The total number of responsive records is approximately
4,200, which would have pushed off the full release of the records until at least 2022. HHS also
alleged that Fauci must personally review each one of his emails before they are released.

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