Donald Trump's assault on the WHO is deeply worrying for global health | Peter Beaumont

A diplomacy shaped around self-serving tittle-tattle now risks lives and undermines America's standing in the world

The campaign by the Trump administration against the World Health Organization has often seemed faintly preposterous.

Over the months of the coronavirus pandemic its untruths and hyperbole have been dismissed by many as iterations of Trumpspeak, whose main purpose has been to distract from the US's catastrophic response to Covid-19, which has claimed almost 140,000 lives and devastated the economy.