Trump freezes WHO funding over China collusion, demands reforms

The "self-explanatory letter" covers Trump's decision for the United States to stop contributions to the World Health Organization "pending an investigation by [the Trump] Administration of the organization's failed response to the COVID-19 outbreak."

Trump highlights the many "serious concerns" found in a review regarding the WHO, due to their "alarming lack of independence from the People's Republic of China."

The evidence includes the WHO's ignoring of credible reports of a virus from Wuhan in early December 2019, including reports from Taiwan and medical journal The Lancet, China's slow response in reporting the information to the WHO, and the WHO's "conspicuous silence" with the shady dealings of China in their own health systems.

The letter also highlights claims made by the WHO that "were either grossly inaccurate or misleading," including the WHO's reaffirming of China's claim the virus wasn't transmitted between humans.

"Perhaps worse than all these failings is that we know that the World Health Organization could have done so much better," the letter reads, pointing to the former work of the WHO during other potential pandemics, such as SARS and MERS.

"I cannot allow American taxpayer dollars to continue to finance an organization that, in its present state, is so clearly not serving America's interests," the letter concludes.

Trump has vocally slammed Tedros and the WHO on several occasions, especially at his April 7 press conference where he accused the organization of being "China-centric."

"The WHO... receives vast amounts of money from the United States... And they actually criticized and disagreed with my travel ban at the time I did it. And they were wrong, they've been wrong about a lot of things. They've had a lot of information early, they seem to be very China-centric."

When asked how the WHO was "China-centric," Trump responded:

"I don't know! They seem to come down on the side of China. Don't close your borders, don't do this, they don't report what's really going on, they didn't see it and yet they were there [in Wuhan.] How do you not see it?" said Trump, referring to the China-WHO joint mission that reported that the Chinese government was reporting responsible accurate information about their coronavirus numbers.