French President Emmanuel Macron, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel were among the leaders who attended a 90-minute video conference on Friday to announce the plan.

The World Health Organization WHO said the collaboration will accelerate the development of "safe, effective drugs, tests and vaccines to prevent, diagnose and treat covid-19, the lung disease caused by the new coronavirus."

- We are trying to shorten the time for a vaccine. We invest more money and increase staff, said French President Macron, and continued:

- I hope the US and China will also participate.

The United States failed

No representative of the US state leadership participated in the global videoconferencing broadcast on the Web, where leaders from Europe, South America and Africa were interchanging. Representatives of the pharmaceutical industry also participated in the video conference, which had technical problems.

Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Melinda Gates also participate in the initiative to accelerate drugs and vaccines against covid-19 that they want to be able to distribute to the world.

"We have an obligation to get it out of equality," said Melinda Gates.

European Commission

According to EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, it is a global goal to have raised over eight billion euros in early May to fund the fight against the disease.

"This is just a first step, more will be needed in the future," she said.