WHO Explains Why It Skipped ‘Xi’ When Naming New COVID-19 Variant Omicron

The World Health Organization (WHO) has explained why it skipped the Greek letters “nu” and “xi” in naming the new COVID-19 variant Omicron.

“Two letters were skipped—Nu and Xi—because Nu is too easily confounded with ‘new’ and Xi was not used because it is a common surname and [the] WHO best practices for naming new diseases … suggest avoiding ‘causing offence to any cultural, social, national, regional, professional, or ethnic groups,'” the United Nations agency said in a statement to The Epoch Times on Saturday.

The WHO best practices for naming new diseases was developed in conjunction with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the U.N. and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) in 2015.

Prof. Jonathan Turley, a criminal attorney and professor at George Washington University, speculated that the WHO “is again avoiding any discomfort for the Chinese government” in skipping the “Xi” letter and naming it Omicron.

“The new variant was expected to be Nu but any additional variant would then be Xi, which happens to be the name of the Chinese leader,” he wrote on Twitter.

“It is not clear if there is another reason for the decision to skip over Nu and Xi, but W.H.O.’s history with the investigation into the origins of the pandemic has fueled speculation as to a political motive,” he suggested. “It is a demonstration of the continuing credibility problems for the organization after its original inquiry. Even the new panel has been criticized for its imbalance and the background of its members.”

On Twitter, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) accused the WHO of being “scared of the Chinese Communist Party.” Meanwhile, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) accused the WHO of being “more concerned about the feelings of the Chinese Communist Party than they are about public health.”

Besides Omicron, the WHO has designated five other “variants of concern” as well as two “variants of interest.”

The WHO earlier this year adopted letters of the Greek Alphabet to have “easy-to-pronounce and non-stigmatising labels” for variants of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus that causes the disease COVID-19.

The Omicron strain, identified as B.1.1.529, was first detected in Botswana and South Africa within the past week. South African scientists say it has an unusual combination of mutations on the spike protein that may make the virus capable of evading immunity from prior infections or vaccination.

https://www.ntd.com/who-explains-why-it-skipped-xi-when-naming-new-covid-19-variant-omicron_707237.html

Whitmer's Michigan paid $3.9B in pandemic unemployment relief to ineligible claimants: audit

Improper payments allegedly continued after abuses were flagged, state says it won't claw back federal taxpayer dollars, and auditor general says "we don't know" if governor knew of corner-cutting.

This week's Golden Horseshoe is awarded to Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's Unemployment Insurance Agency, which disbursed an estimated $3.9 billion in improper pandemic unemployment benefits and continued to pay ineligible claimants after being alerted to the issue, a state audit found.

The Michigan UIA paid out billions in improper payments through three federal pandemic relief programs: Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, and Lost Wages Assistance. PUC, through the federal CARES Act, boosted unemployment payments by $600 per week.

"Ultimately, UIA's application and weekly certification processes allowed individuals without any prior attachment to the workforce and who may have been unemployed for reasons unrelated to COVID-19 to be paid PUA and associated PUC and LWA program benefits improperly," Michigan Auditor General Doug Ringler reported in the audit.

The audit found that UIA's senior leadership, through both actions and inaction, "directly contributed to the creation of invalid PUA application and certification processes and UIA's failure to timely and appropriately address issues pointed out by the U.S. Department of Labor and UIA staff.”

Two months after the CARES Act was signed into law by then-President Donald Trump, the U.S. Department of Labor "communicated at least a few states had 'seriously cut corners' in their implementation of PUA eligibility and noted significant issues with Michigan's eligibility documentation," the audit found.

Michigan's UIA continued to follow its improper payment criteria even after that first alert in May 2020 and after the U.S. DOL directly contacted the agency in June 2020 about its issues.

"UIA did not correct its improper eligibility criteria when the USDOL first communicated issues directly to UIA in June 2020," the audit found.

UIA continued paying ineligible claimants for an additional nine months.

https://justthenews.com/accountability/watchdogs/sunwhitmers-michigan-paid-39b-pandemic-unemployment-relief-ineligible

China finds 12 million children that it didn’t know existed

China undercounted the number of children born in 2000 to 2010 by at least 11.6 million — equivalent to Belgium’s current population — partly because of its stringent one-child policy.

The latest statistical yearbook released by the government puts the number of children born during that period at 172.5 million, well above the 160.9 million in that age group recorded in the 2010 census.

The difference could be the result of some parents failing to register births to avoid punishment if they breached the one-child policy. China only started allowing all couples to have a second child in 2016, meaning some parents wouldn’t officially report a newborn if they were over the quota until the child turned six and needed to register for school, according to independent demographer He Yafu.

About 57% of the children later registered were girls, indicating the discrepancy could be partly linked to parents not reporting girls so they could continue to try for a boy.

In addition, the 2010 census was conducted on Nov. 1, 2010, so would have missed births in the last two months of the year. Census surveys also typically don’t include people who have died or emigrated in the intervening years.

The revisions show how hard it is to accurately count the number of people in the world’s most populous country. Birthrates for the years 2011 to 2017 were also revised upwards in the latest statistical yearbook, suggesting the problem of undercounting the number of children likely continued after 2010.

However, with China now effectively abandoning limits on family size, there could be less of a discrepancy in future. While the cap for most families is currently set at three children, there are no penalties for exceeding it.

Nevertheless, the number of births is expected to continue declining in China, and the total population could start shrinking as early as this year.

https://americanmilitarynews.com/2021/11/china-finds-12-million-children-that-it-didnt-know-existed/

The Hundred-Year Marathon: China's Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower

326 pages

https://elkitab.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/by-Michael-Pillsbury-The-Hundred-Year-Marathon-3572536-z-lib.org_.pdf

>>15092065

Political Warfare - Strategies for Combating China’s Plan to “Win without Fighting”

217 pages

https://www.usmcu.edu/Portals/218/Political%20Warfare_web.pdf