(File photo: Global Times)

GENEVA, April 20 (Xinhua) -- The World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday said that it has been worked closely with experts from the United States, especially after the coronavirus outbreak, and all the information is open to every country from the beginning.

Speaking at a virtual press conference from Geneva, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that his organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has a long cooperation relationship and "having CDC staff means there is nothing hidden from the U.S. from day one".

"There is no secret in WHO because keeping things confidential or secret is dangerous. There is no secret in WHO because it's about lives, and even a single life is very precious," he said.

Earlier, the Washington Post reported that U.S. researchers working with WHO were feeding real-time information to the White House as the coronavirus outbreak began in China at the end of 2019.

In contrast with President Donald Trump's accusations that the WHO didn't share early information about the outbreak, the Post report showed that high-level U.S. health officials "consulted regularly" with their WHO counterparts.

"We don't hide anything. We want all countries to get the same message immediately because that helps countries to prepare well and to prepare quickly," Tedros told reporters at Monday's press conference.

"We have been warning, we have been warning from day one. This is a devil that everybody should fight, we need strong national unity, we need global solidarity," the WHO chief stressed.

"Let's not play with fire," he said, adding that if there is strong national unity and global solidarity, the world still can win the fight against the COVID-19.

"Without the two, trust us, the worst is yet ahead of us," he warned.