US President Trump freezes WHO funds over mismanagement of COVID-19 crisis

U.S President, Donald Trump ordered a freeze on funding for the World Health Organization for “mismanaging” the coronavirus crisis, as world leaders weighed easing lockdowns that threaten to tip the global economy into a second Great Depression.

The death toll from the pandemic has topped 125,000, with nearly two million people infected by the disease that has upended society and changed lives for billions confined to their homes around the globe.

World leaders are agonising over when to lift lockdown measures to jump-start devastated economies but still avoid a second wave of infections.

And with the world battling to get on top of the pandemic, the US President fired a broadside at the WHO and halted payments that amounted to $400 million last year.

Funding would be frozen pending a review into the WHO’s role in “severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus,” said Trump, who accused the Geneva-based body of putting “political correctness above life-saving measures.”

Beijing hit back, saying the move was bad for the global fight.

“The current global epidemic situation is grim. It is at a critical moment. This US decision will weaken WHO’s capacities and undermine the international cooperation against the epidemic,” said Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian.

Trump also earned a rebuke from the head of the UN and entrepreneur Bill Gates who tweeted that cutting funding was “as dangerous as it sounds.”

The president’s controversial attack came as the US counted a record of 2,228 victims over the past 24 hours, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Nevertheless, Trump vowed to reboot large sections of the world’s top economy “very soon,” saying the US would reopen “in beautiful little pieces”, with the hardest-hit areas such as New York taking slightly longer.