The Trump administration has said it will opt out of a global effort to develop and distribute a vaccine against coronavirus because the World Health Organization and China are involved in it.
“The United States will continue to engage our international partners to ensure we defeat this virus, but we will not be constrained by multilateral organisations influenced by the corrupt World Health Organization and China,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere.
“This president will spare no expense to ensure that any new vaccine maintains our own Food and Drug Administration’s gold standard for safety and efficacy is thoroughly tested and saves lives,” he added.
More than 170 countries are engaged in discussions to potentially participate in the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility, or COVAX, which aims to speed up vaccine development, and distribute them equitably around the world.
The initiative is jointly led by the WHO, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and Gavi, the vaccine alliance.
The United States had decided to pull out of the WHO in July saying that the UN agency is in need of reform and is influenced by China.
The advocacy organization ONE Campaign slammed the decision as a move that will put the lives of millions around the world at risk, and could completely isolate Americans from an effective vaccine against COVID-19.
“Paired with the U.S. withdrawal from the WHO, these decisions are an abdication of U.S. global leadership in fighting pandemics and will extend the life of COVID-19 globally, increase the death count and cost the world more money,” said Tom Hart, North America executive director at The ONE Campaign.
A sudden rise in new coronavirus cases and related deaths was reported in the United States Tuesday.
With 44,639 new cases reporting in the last 24 hours, the total number of infections in the country rose to 6075652 as of Johns Hopkins University’s latest update Wednesday. This is a rise of around 40 percent cases from what was reported in the previous day.
The death rate also went up by nearly three times from what was reported on Monday.
With 1,091 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, the total death toll in the U.S. reached 184689.
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