Trump secretly seeks Asian, European allies’ medical help amid coronavirus spread
US President Donald Trump has privately asked some of the US allies in Europe and Asia, including South Korea, to help the country overcome the shortages caused by coronavirus spread.
The South Korean government announced on Wednesday that it is considering the possibility whether the country has sufficient stockpiles of coronavirus test kits in a bid to send them to the US following Trump’s phone call on Tuesday with his South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in.
The South Korean presidency, the Blue House, further added that the call was made at Trump’s “urgent request.”
This comes after Trump assured on Tuesday evening that his administration would not rely on foreign nations for help in fight against coronavirus.
“We should never be reliant on a foreign country for the means of our own survival,” Trump said at a White House briefing. “America will never be a supplicant nation.”
Meanwhile, Foreign Policy reported that he US State Department has asked all its top diplomats to press the governments in Europe and Eurasia to ramp up exports and production of medical equipment to the US.
“Depending on critical needs, the United States could seek to purchase many of these items in the hundreds of millions with purchases of higher end equipment such as ventilators in the hundreds of thousands,” an email sent to embassies in Europe and Eurasia said.
The appeal comes at a time that the EU governments are themselves struggling to deal with one of the worst pandemics to spread around the globe since the 1918 treasury.
The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 720 people and infected some 50,000 in the United States, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
US health experts have sharply rebuked Trump’s administration for initially downplaying the crisis and lagging behind in testing efforts.
The US Defense Department warned on Tuesday that the fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak in the country could continue for months.
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