Saudi Gazette report

KUWAIT CITY — US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met here on Wednesday with World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the US Department of State said in a statement.

The US secretary of state and the WHO chief discussed opportunities for collaboration to continue reforming and strengthening the WHO, while also building greater global pandemic preparedness and response capacity across the board.

Blinken affirmed US support for the WHO’s plans to conduct additional studies into the COVID-19 origins, including in China, to better understand the current pandemic and prevent future ones.

The US secretary of state stressed the need for the next phase to be timely, evidence-based, transparent, expert-led, and free from interference.

Blinken emphasized the importance of the international community coming together on this matter of critical concern and reiterated our support for a multilateral approach to global health security more broadly.

Blinken and Tedros committed to working together and with all member states to make meaningful, concrete progress in strengthening global health security to prevent, detect and respond to future pandemics and health threats.

After the meeting, both of them took to Twitter to share the issues they discussed with Blinken saying: "In a meeting with DG Tedros, we discussed saving lives by ending this pandemic and advancing global health security. The US supports the @WHO plans for additional studies into COVID-19 origins, including in PRC, to better understand this pandemic and prevent future ones."

The WHO chief responded to the US secretary of state's tweet, saying: "Thank you, @SecBlinken, for a very good discussion on accelerating an end to the #COVID19 pandemic through #VaccinEquity, strengthening @WHO, global pandemic preparedness & response, & the importance of understanding the origins of the current pandemic."