Pompeo knocks WHO as White House halts funding: 'We need answers ... we need transparency'
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Get all the latest news on coronavirus and more delivered daily to your inbox. Sign up here.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo joined "Hannity" Tuesday to discuss the coronavirus pandemic and the World Health Organization's (WHO) ineffectiveness, saying the organization needs to "do its job."
"They had access to the Chinese Communist Party, [but] didn't give Americans access when we needed in their most timely point at the very beginning," Pompeo told host Sean Hannity. "And then we know they have this lab. We know about the wet markets. We know that the virus itself did originate in Wuhan. So all those things come together."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}THE CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK, STATE-BY-STATE
President Trump announced earlier Tuesday that the United States will immediately halt all funding for the WHO, saying it had put "political correctness over lifesaving measures."
Pompeo again called for transparency from the WHO, saying it's the global health agency's job to publish accurate and timely information.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"We still have this virus out there. You talked about trying to get the economy growing, not only here in the United States, but around the world. We need answers to these questions, we need transparency," Pompeo said. "And we need the World Health Organization to do its job, to perform its primary function, which is to make sure that the world has accurate, timely, effective, real information about what's going on in the global health space. And they didn't get that done here."
CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE
The secretary of state added that China has stated that they want to cooperate with the rest of the world, but made clear that Beijing must give up information in order to do so.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"The Chinese say they want cooperation. We want that, too. But to cooperate, you have to have information. You have to have data. You have to have transparency," Pompeo said. "Those are the elements of cooperation. We still want China to do that. We still need information about what actually took place there."
Fox News' Gregg Re contributed to this report.