This week, the WHO delivered the findings of its investigation in China and ensured that the hypothesis that the coronavirus could have escaped from a laboratory was "highly unlikely."
On Europe 1 on Saturday, François Godement, historian specializing in Asia at the Institut Montaigne, deplores that it "was much too short" and assures that it should "be started again."
INTERVIEW
Will we one day know where (really) the Covid-19 comes from?
More than a year after the first cases of coronavirus were reported in China, the epicenter of the crisis, the boss of the World Health Organization affirmed that "all the hypotheses remain on the table" to determine the origin of the pandemic.
Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made this statement at a press conference which concluded a one-month mission on site by experts appointed by the WHO.
Except that for François Godement, specialist in Asia and guest of the morning in Europe 1 this Saturday, "the only conclusion that can be drawn from the WHO investigation is that it was very too short."
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"The further away we are from the moment of contamination, the less certain we are of what we are"
WHO experts appeared to rule out the possibility that the virus may have escaped the city's virological institute, as the Trump administration claimed a few months ago.
They raised a "highly improbable" hypothesis.
"The reality is that we know absolutely nothing about it," replied François Godement, specialist in Asia at the Institut Montaigne.
"It is not in three hours that we debrief all the staff of a laboratory!", He denounces at the microphone of Europe 1, indicating that it would be necessary to know if the WHO "had access to real archives "and whether the witnesses questioned were able to speak freely.
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A hypothesis not so crazy as that
“Basically, we would have to start over,” says François Godement.
And quickly, because, he explains, "the further one goes from the moment of the contamination, the less certain one is of what one finds."
"All the analyzes carried out after the fact risk giving what are called false positives", develops the specialist in Asia at the microphone of Europe 1.
"The only chance is that a whistleblower appears in China"
Especially since China is playing time.
"The WHO tried to send an investigation team from February 2020," recalls François Godement.
Except that nothing forces China to welcome it, he emphasizes.
"There is an obligation for member countries of the World Health Organization to accept an investigation team, but there is no sanction if they say no!" Continues François Godement.
As recently as a month and a half ago, he notes, "China delayed the process because it did not want an independent cameraman with the crew."
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But will we ever get answers?
"In my opinion, the only chance we have today of knowing the origin of the pandemic is that a whistleblower appears in China," replied François Godement.
“Apart from this hypothesis, without a very long local investigation to understand which animal transmitted the disease, we will never know,” he concludes.