Euronews
The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is “way worse than the global financial crisis”, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Friday, adding that the organisation is prepared to use its “one trillion dollar war chest” to help the most vulnerable.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said on Friday during a press conference hosted by the World Health Organisation (WHO) that the COVID-19 pandemic is “a crisis like no other”.
“Never in the history of the IMF we have witnessed the world economy coming to a standstill. We are now in recession,” she said.
She added that in the same way the deadly disease hits vulnerable people with pre-existing medical conditions, it has also hitting vulnerable economies the hardest.
“We have a $1 trillion (€930 billions) war chest and we are determined to use as much as necessary in protecting the economy from the scarring of this crisis,” she went on.
Over 90 countries have now asked the IMF for emergency funding, Georgieva also revealed.
The novel coronavirus has killed more than 55,000 people around the world and over a million have now been infected. Europe remains the hardest-hit region, accounting for more than 35,000 of the fatalities.
Spain reported on Friday a total of 117,710 cases of coronavirus, thus surpassing Italy as the second-worst hit country in the world.
The country’s death toll has already passed 10,000 but remains behind Italy where 766 new deaths were registered on Friday, bringing the total number of victims to 14,681.
France and the UK are also especially impacted by the pandemic.
British authorities announced on Friday that a further 684 people had succumbed to the disease over the previous 24 hours, bringing the total number of fatalities in the country to 3,605.
Health Minister Matt Hancock revealed during the government’s daily press conference that two nurses and two healthcare assistants had been included in the new death toll.
He also announced that two further Nightingale hospitals, in Bristol and Harrogate, would be built with a combined capacity of 1,500 beds. The first such hospital was opened on Friday in east London and two others, in Birmingham and Manchester, are due to open shortly.
In France, the death toll reached 6,507 on Friday with 5,091 deaths recorded in hospitals — an increase of 588 over the previous day — and a further 1,416 registered in old people’s home.
French health authorities only started communicating the number of fatalities in old people’s home on Thursday. They then stood at 884.