U.S. President Donald Trump said he expects the country to receive a vaccine against coronavirus by the end of 2020. The American leader noted that a number of departments act as quickly as possible to obtain authorizations for certain drugs.

“We are actively working on this,” he said on Fox News.

Trump said earlier that over 70 treatments for COVID-19 are being tested in the United States.

At the moment, the United States is in first place in terms of the number of infected with coronavirus. More than 1.1 million cases of infection were detected in the country, the death toll exceeded 67 thousand.

In turn, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called on all countries to join forces in the fight against coronavirus and noted that vaccine development is not a race between states.

“To win this battle, we need to work together to create an invulnerable shield that protects our people, and this can only be achieved through mass production of the vaccine,” Johnson said.

Earlier, the Italian authorities, where at the end of April a decline in the number of deaths was recorded, decided to gradually weaken the restrictive measures. According to Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, from May 4 parks and gardens will be opened, production and work at construction sites, as well as wholesale trade will be resumed. Shops, museums, restaurants and beauty salons are planned to open in late May and early June. Also from May 4, some citizens will again begin to work.

“More than 4 million Italians will return to work, go by public transport, and many companies and factories will start up again,” Conte wrote on his Facebook.

He added that in Italy begins the "second phase of the emergency" - coexistence with the virus.

In addition, on Saturday, Western media published material citing a report from the US Department of Homeland Security stating that the Chinese authorities “concealed” the prevalence of coronavirus and data on the high probability of infection in order to stock up on medicines.

The document says that during January, the PRC allegedly withheld data on the dangers of coronavirus from the World Health Organization, while at that time it increased imports and reduced exports of medical supplies.

The material claims that the Chinese authorities denied the fact of export restrictions, and delayed the provision of their trade data.

Official confirmation of this information, as well as comments by the Chinese authorities have been reported.

In the meantime, in the PRC, three new cases of COVID-19 were detected per day. According to the State Health Committee of the country, all of them were imported from abroad.

  • Reuters
  • © Benoit Tessier

Recall that in late March, the Chinese authorities began to weaken quarantine measures after the epidemic in the country began to decline. In Hubei, which became the epicenter of the disease, quarantine was lifted, and in Wuhan, public transport partially resumed operation.

Also, local authorities begin to open access for tourists to attractions. From April 29, it became possible to visit the Yellow Crane Tower, where no more than 5400 guests are allowed daily after checking the temperature and providing a green health code.

In Japan, a government advisory committee approved a decision to extend the country's emergency regime until May 31. On May 2, the country recorded the highest daily death rate among those with a coronavirus, 39 people died there.

“The Advisory Committee supported the plan to extend the emergency situation throughout the country until May 31,” said Minister for Economic Recovery Yasutoshi Nishimura.

In France, the number of deaths exceeded 24 thousand, almost 169 thousand cases of coronavirus infection were detected in the country. In Germany there are more than 165 thousand, over 6.8 thousand people have died. 

The World Health Organization on March 11 announced an outbreak of a new coronavirus infection COVID-19 with a pandemic. According to Johns Hopkins University, the number of detected cases in the world exceeded 3.5 million, more than 247 thousand people have died since the pandemic. The countries most affected by the disease remain the United States, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and France.