On 7 August, 2020 an online meeting of Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov with Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO and Hans Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe was held.
As Dr Kluge reported on his Facebook page, during negotiations WHO expressed serious concern about a rise in COVID-19 negative pneumonia and urged for a WHO team to sample independently COVID-19 tests in-country and take to WHO reference labs.
According to Kluge, the President agreed.
Today Dr Tedros & me met the President on COVID19 situation in Turkmenistan.
WHO expressed serious concern about …
Gepostet von Hans Kluge Jr. am Freitag, 7. August 2020
The Turkmen state-run information agency TDH also made a coverage of the meeting. According to the news outlet, Berdymukhammedov talked about the outbreak of “pneumonia of unknown origin” in the region assuming it might be caused by novel coronavirus.
Following the meeting with WHO officials, the President held an online meeting with the Interior Minister Rashid Meredov and Minister Healthcare and Medical Industry Nurmukhammed Amannepesov.
TDH does not specify what instructions were given to Turkmen officials and used the vague wording “taking into account the present-day requirements all efforts need to be taken to improve the efficiency of undertaken measures”.