Ex-President of Liberia to head WHO monitoring team

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the former President of Liberia, and Helen Clark, the former Prime Minister of New Zealand, will lead a monitoring team for global responses to the coronavirus pandemic. This was reported by Air Force Africa with reference to a statement by the World Health Organization (WHO). Sirleaf led Liberia during the Ebola epidemic, which began in 2014 and killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa. New Zealand was noted as a successful example of combating the coronavirus pandemic. The head of WHO, Tedros Adanom Ghebreyesus, said that the time had come to strengthen cooperation to contain the pandemic. Thanks to you, the world will understand the truth about what happened, and also decide to build our better future as one humanity, Tedros said. WHO representatives have been calling for some time to review measures to combat the pandemic, said Air Force correspondent in Geneva Imogen Foulkes. The organization faced criticism, especially from the United States, for its slow response to the outbreak of the virus in China. The new monitoring group will assess not only the WHO response to the pandemic, but also the measures taken by governments around the world against the spread of coronavirus. The WHO also warned that most countries have not yet taken control of the spread of the virus, adding that the greatest threat is not the virus itself, but the lack of leadership in combating it. Earlier this week, US authorities officially notified the UN of their intention to leave the WHO. According to Johns Hopkins University, more than three million people in the United States are infected with coronavirus much more than in any other country in the world.