In the year since the World Health Organization first described the Covid-19 outbreak as a pandemic, it has faced towering criticism, but has also been showered with praise. Here is an overview of the main criticisms and plaudits the United Nations health agency has faced since the Covid-19 outbreak first surfaced in China in December 2019. Acted too slowly From the very start, the WHO faced criticism that it was mishandling the crisis. Some accused it of taking too long to recognise that the virus was easily transmitting between humans. But most of the criticism has focused on its initial reluctance to declare a global health emergency, and in particular to utter the word “pandemic”. The WHO learned on December 31, 2019 of a mysterious pneumonia outbreak in Wuhan and has repeatedly insisted it immediately jumped into action. But it was not until January 30, 2020 that WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus declared the situation a Public Health Emergency of International Concern — the highest level of alarm under international health rules. Top WHO experts had gathered a week earlier, but initially failed to agree on whether the PHEIC label was warranted at a time when, outside China, there were fewer than 100 Covid-19 cases and no deaths. And while the PHEIC technically is the highest level of alarm, many countries did not spring into action until Tedros finally used the word “pandemic” on March 11. The word, which does not feature in the official international health alert system, appears to have more aptly conveyed the urgency of the situation, sending large swathes of the planet into lockdown. Kowtowing to China From the start, the UN health agency met criticism for its over-the-top praise of Beijing’s early response to the crisis. It was also lambasted for allowing more than a year to pass before managing to send in a team of international experts to investigate the origins of the virus, and was accused of allowing China to dictate the parameters of their mission. Former US president Donald Trump slammed the WHO as a “puppet” of Beijing, which his administration and others accused of covering up the start of the outbreak and allowing the virus to spread around the entire world. The United States — traditionally WHO’s largest donor — also began withdrawing from the organisation. While that process was immediately reversed when Trump’s successor Joe Biden entered the White House in January, his administration has also expressed “deep concerns” about the early findings of the WHO expert mission to China.