The WHO’s Deceiver-General
The WHO’s Deceiver-General
A close look at Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
By Discover The Networks
When President Trump announced that his administration would withhold all U.S. funding from the World Health Organization, pending an investigation of its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus promptly straightened the halo atop his head and proceeded to address the world in the sober tones of a selfless, afflicted martyr: “For now,” he said, “our focus, my focus, is on stopping this virus and saving lives. WHO is getting on with the job…. When we’re divided, the virus exploits the cracks between us.” But as a close look at Tedros’s handling of the current crisis will attest, “getting on with the job” has been, from the outset, the very least of his priorities. Indeed, his principal function has been to serve as a propagandist on behalf of China, whitewashing the Communist regime’s astounding malfeasance every step along the way.
Let us look at exactly how this man became the leader of the powerful WHO, a specialized agency of the United Nations.
After obtaining a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1986, Tedros joined the Ethiopian government’s Ministry of Health as a junior public health expert. Following the fall of Mengistu Haile Mariam, the tyrant who ruled Ethiopia from 1977-91, Tedros moved to London to attend graduate school. He then returned to Ethiopia and in 2001 was appointed head of the Tigray Regional Health Bureau. Two years later, he was named a State Minister of Health.
From 2005-12, Tedros served as Ethiopia’s Federal Minister of Health. While holding that position, he purposely covered up three separate outbreaks of cholera (in 2006, 2009, and 2011) by simply renaming the deadly epidemics as “Acute Watery Diarrhea (AWD)” – even after the diagnosis of Vibrio Cholerae, the bacteria that causes cholera, had been confirmed. According to the Amhara Professionals Union, a Washington-based organization that seeks to protect the political and economic rights of the Amhara people of northwest Ethiopia: “[Tedros’s] priority … was to conceal the impact a public admission of Cholera epidemic might have on Tourism and [the] image of his Party, rather than protecting the international community and attempting to reach out to the affected areas. Such a sad error due to lack of judgment resulted in a nationwide epidemic.”
From 2012-16, Tedros was Ethiopia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs. During that period, he greatly strengthened his own personal — as well as his nation’s — ties to Communist China. Indeed, during Tedros’s years as Foreign Minister, China loaned more than $13 billion to his impoverished country. Beijing’s massive investments in Ethiopia were intended, in part, to make the latter a strategic bridge for China’s imperialist designs on the African continent.
In December 2014, Tedros and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi wrote a joint op-ed in which they gave voice to the close bond that was developing between their respective countries. “[O]n the basis of the principles of equality, mutual respect and win-win cooperation,” said the authors, “China and Ethiopia have developed multi-dimensional relations … We are sincere friends, reliable partners, and good brothers … each rejoicing in the successes the other has achieved…. China has become the biggest foreign investor and the largest trading partner of Ethiopia.”
In 2017, Tedros ran for the post of Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), But at that same time, a report appeared in the Ethiopian News & Views bulletin stating that he stood accused of complicity in the commission of “crimes against humanity.” That charge was related not only to the three aforementioned cholera coverups, but also to allegations surrounding Tedros’s longstanding political affiliation with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), an organization that: (a) grew out of the Marxist-Leninist League of Tigray (MLLT), and (b) was responsible for horrific atrocities in Ethiopia — particularly targeting the Amhara ethnic group in the country’s northwest region. In the 1990s, the U.S. government listed TPLF as a terrorist group. The Global Terror Database continues to list it as such, given the group’s ongoing commission of armed attacks in rural areas. Meanwhile, the aforementioned Amhara Professionals Union has issued many accusations of systematic discrimination and human-rights abuses perpetrated by TPLF.
Tedros, for his part, is a high-ranking member of TPLF’s Central Committee, or politburo. The “crimes against humanity” allegations pertain to a systematic genocide that was carried out — at a time when Tedros was a leading figure in Ethiopia’s public-health infrastructure — against the Amhara, whom TPLF has identified as its “eternal enemy.” As the Amhara Professionals Union explains:
“The candidate has treated his own citizens differently based on their ethnicity…. [Tedros], who descends from Tigre ethnic group, disfavored the ‘Amhara Regional State’ through poor health care. For instance, disproportionately high mortality coupled with selective application of contraceptives use has led to a selective reduction of the growth rate of the Amhara people. Such disparities were created and gaps increased across all measures of health in his leadership tenure. Of particular importance is the unexplained 2.5 million decrease in the Amhara population [between 1994 and 2007] under his healthcare leadership. The Amharas were victimized and punished due to their ethnic background.”
TPLF provided millions of dollars for Tedros’s campaign to become the leader of the WHO. Those funds – along with vital support from China – propelled Tedros to victory when, at the Seventieth World Health Assembly in May 2017, the WHO Member States elected him to a five-year term as their Director-General, making him the first person to hold that position without a medical degree. Notably, the wife of Chinese President Xi Jinping was the WHO’s longtime goodwill ambassador – a post that enabled her to effectively promote Chinese interests under the penumbra of the UN.
Upon formally taking the reins of the WHO on July 1, 2017, Tedros outlined several priorities upon which he intended to focus. Most notably: (a) universal health coverage (based on models in Ethiopia, Rwanda and Sri Lanka), and (b) the health impacts of climate and environmental change.
On October 18, 2017, Tedros announced that he had chosen Zimbabwe’s former president, the Marxist tyrant Robert Mugabe, to serve as a WHO goodwill ambassador helping to deal with non-communicable diseases in Africa. Tedros justified his selection of Mugabe by lauding Zimbabwe as “a country that places universal health coverage and health promotion at the center of its policies to provide health care to all.” But in fact, Zimbabwe’s health system, like everything else under the broad shadow of Mugabe’s dictatorship, was in total collapse. Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that Mugabe’s “utter mismanagement of the economy has devastated health services” in his homeland. HRW’s Kenneth Roth noted that “[w]hen you go to Zimbabwean hospitals, they lack the most basic necessities.” And the prominent Zimbabwean politician Obert Gutu said: “The Zimbabwe health delivery system is in a shambolic state, it is an insult. Mugabe trashed our health delivery system…. he allowed our public hospitals to collapse.” Moreover, it was an open secret that even Mugabe himself did not use his own country’s health system when he needed medical care, traveling instead to Singapore for treatment. As a result of widespread public outrage sparked by the Mugabe nomination, Tedros was forced to withdraw Mugabe’s name from consideration.
During the deadly coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic which originated in Wuhan, China last fall before infecting millions of people in more than 180 countries across the globe, Tedros was very slow to take any measures to stem the spread of the disease. On December 31, 2019, Taiwanese officials warned the WHO that they had seen evidence that the coronavirus could be spread by means of human-to-human transmission. But because the agency, in deference to Beijing, did not have a normal relationship with Taiwan, the warning was ignored. Fully two weeks later — on January 14, 2020 — the WHO tweeted that: “Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission.” The agency did not correct that falsehood until January 21.
On January 22-23 – by which time the coronavirus had already spread to a number of other countries – a WHO emergency committee debated whether or not to declare COVID-19 a “public health emergency of international concern.” But Tedros elected not to do so, and instead took a trip to Beijing to discuss the matter with Chinese officials. When he finally issued a “public health emergency” declaration on January 30, Tedros took pains to point out that the “WHO doesn’t recommend limiting trade and movement.” That announcement was accompanied by a large dose of propaganda on China’s behalf. “The Chinese government is to be congratulated for the extraordinary measures it has taken to contain the [coronavirus] outbreak,” said Tedros, adding: “I left in absolutely no doubt about China’s commitment to transparency, and to protecting the world’s people.” “We would have seen many more cases outside China by now,” he emphasized, “and probably deaths — if it were not for the government’s efforts, and the progress they have made to protect their own people and the people of the world.”
In the first week of February, Tedros reiterated that it was unnecessary for nations around the world to implement any restrictions that might “unnecessarily interfere with international travel and trade.” He also sang the praises of China yet again: “I was so impressed with my meeting with President Xi and his commitment to take serious measures to prevent the spread of the virus to other countries.”
As February gave way to March, Tedros continued to laud Beijing for what he described as its exemplary response to the virus outbreak. As late as March 9, he fervently denied any suggestion that the virus had become a pandemic. In fact, the WHO did not assign that term to the outbreak until March 11. By repeatedly covering for China’s lies and malfeasance, Tedros and the WHO caused populations across the globe to lose precious time in initiating their battle strategies against the pandemic. By mid-April, more than 150,000 people worldwide had died of COVID-19, and economic ruin had descended upon every corner of the earth. The Wall Street Journal reports that, according to a University of Southampton study, “the number of coronavirus cases could have been reduced by 95% had China moved to contain the virus three weeks sooner.” But instead, Tedros and the WHO were busy heaping praise upon Beijing for having set “a new standard for outbreak response.”
In light of the long litany of abuses and deceptions perpetrated by Dr. Tedros, it is remarkable to reflect upon the fact that in 2011, he received the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Humanitarian Award in recognition of his contributions to the field of public health. By that time, he had already covered up three deadly cholera epidemics in his home country – for purely selfish reasons.
And now, following his latest round of deception and failure in dealing with a health crisis, Tedros is once again the object of fawning praise from people portraying him, this time, as a victim of President Trump’s mean-spiritedness. The Washington Post, for instance, reacted to Trump’s WHO funding cuts by lamenting that the president’s critiques of the Organization “are simply wrong,” “unjustified,” and dangerous”; charging that “Mr. Trump and his GOP pals are looking for scapegoats to distract attention from the administration’s bungling” of the pandemic; and claiming that Tedros and the WHO have “been transparent” while performing the “urgent work” that has made them “a mainstay of the global response” to the crisis.
Trump-detesters in the entertainment industry are likewise singing from the same hymnal of hate as The Washington Post. Consider, for one, the ever-yelping Lady Gaga, who, upon learning of Trump’s funding cuts to the WHO, reflexively thanked Tedros for the countless good deeds he has done on behalf of the world’s people during these dark days and weeks. “Dr. Tedros, you’re truly a superstar,” said Gaga.
Tedros’s ascension to the very top of the WHO hierarchy – coupled with the honorifics lavished upon him by the likes of Jimmy Carter, The Washington Post, and Lady Gaga – are living proof of one of mankind’s most melancholy truisms: Every lying reprobate and tyrant has his admirers.