Irish Examiner view: WHO access to Wuhan data vital in effort to avoid  threat from next pandemic

Closer international collaboration is vital to reduce the risk of the next pandemic

File image of a worker in protective coverings directing members of the World Health Organization (WHO) team on their arrival at the airport in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, last year. Picture: AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File

It is just over a year since the World Health Organization (WHO) made its last visit to China in an attempt to isolate the causes of the coronavirus that has wreaked such havoc.

Further requests to return to Wuhan to pursue a hypothesis that the virus leaked from a laboratory have been denied by Chinese authorities as “not scientific”.