"Taiwan didn't report any human-to-human transmission" of COVID-19: WHO chief

GENEVA, April 21 -- Taiwan's health authorities did not report any human-to-human transmission of coronavirus to the World Health Organization (WHO) in its email at the end of last year, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday.

"Taiwan didn't report any human-to-human transmission," Tedros told a news conference, adding that the email the WHO received from Taiwan was to get more clarification on the epidemic based on an official report from Wuhan.

The Democratic Progressive Party authority in Taiwan recently claimed that the island's epidemic prevention department had warned the WHO about the people-to-people transmission of the virus.

"One thing that has to be clear is the first email was not from Taiwan ... The first report came from Wuhan," the WHO chief said.

Michael Ryan, executive director of WHO health emergencies program, said that "at no point in the process of communication, in this email that's been received, was there any reference to human-to-human transmission, or any other issue. It was purely requesting relevant information and thanking us in advance for our attention to the matter."

Zhu Fenglian, a spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, said on Friday that the only source of the messages sent by Taiwan is the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission and Taiwan's health authorities just cited the mainland's information.