I would go with this assumption. Best to assume neglect over mal intent.
This behavior was seen before too with the devs behind the new Gmod in Source 2 (Alyx engine). They spent months trying to get in touch with access and it came down to an employee who ended up getting fired for neglecting responsibilities. Now everything seems to be working out and open tooling is being developed.
WHO statement on masks was misleading but I didn't see it as wrong (only wrong in the sense that they should focus on people's perception of their statements). They said that there was no evidence that masks help. Which was true at the time. They paired that statement with suggestions use a variety of prevention methods.
The statement from Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove that symptomatic patients being "very rare" was definitely wrong. But she back tracked the next day and said it only possible they are rare and was aware of the 40% models which have now come out to be much closer to the truth.
This behavior was seen before too with the devs behind the new Gmod in Source 2 (Alyx engine). They spent months trying to get in touch with access and it came down to an employee who ended up getting fired for neglecting responsibilities. Now everything seems to be working out and open tooling is being developed.