Italy prosecutors: WHO exec lied about spiked virus report

ROME (AP) — Italian prosecutors have accused a top World Health Organization official of lying to them about a spiked U.N. report into Italy’s coronavirus response, revealing private communications Friday that are likely to embarrass the U.N. agency.

Prosecutors in Bergamo placed Dr. Ranieri Guerra, WHO’s assistant director general, under investigation for allegedly making false declarations to them when he voluntarily agreed to be questioned in November. Guerra had been WHO’s liaison with the Italian government after Italy became the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak in Europe last year.

Prosecutors are investigating the huge COVID-19 death toll in Bergamo and whether Italy’s lack of preparedness going into the pandemic played a role. Their probe expanded to include the related scandal over the spiked WHO report into Italy's virus response because it revealed that the Italian government hadn’t updated its pandemic preparedness plan since 2006.

The U.N. health agency pulled the report from its website May 14, a day after it went up, and never republished it. Its disappearance suggested that the WHO removed it to spare the Italian government criticism, embarrassment and liability.

When asked at the time whether Guerra or the Italian government had intervened to spike the report, WHO said it was removed by its regional office in Copenhagen because it contained “factual inaccuracies.”

But the documents released by Bergamo prosecutors, first reported by state-run RAI Report, indicated that Guerra maneuvered to have the report removed because the Italian government was upset with it. The document included private WhatsApp chats between Guerra and a top Italian public health official, Dr. Silvio Brusaferro.

Prosecutors cited Guerra's comments to them, which they said were contradicted by the facts, and...