US experts call for establishment of commission on evaluation of COVID-19 response: media

WASHINGTON -- The United States should establish a commission on evaluation of its COVID-19 response, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has cited US leading experts as saying.

An article, entitled "A Covid Commission Americans Can Trust," was co-written by US experts Martin Kulldorff and Jay Bhattacharya and published by the WSJ on June 27.

Kulldorff, a biostatistician and epidemiologist, is a professor at Harvard Medical School, and Bhattacharya, a physician and economist, works as a professor at Stanford Medical School.

The authors quoted in the article a bill introduced by US Senator Bob Menendez and Senator Susan Collins, who have suggested that a commission be set up to examine the origins of the COVID-19 virus, the early response to the epidemic, and equity issues in the disease's impact.

However, the commission "shouldn't concern itself with the origin of the virus, which is best left to other investigative bodies and would distract from evaluating the response," the article wrote.

"For a commission to be credible, it needs to be broad in both scope and membership. Members can't have conflicts of interest," it said.