Biden to Join G-7 Leaders in Virtual Meeting to Discuss Pandemic Response

WASHINGTON—President Biden will participate in a virtual meeting of the Team of 7 industrialized nations on Friday, the White House mentioned, joining a discussion board for leaders of member countries to discuss strategies to defeat the coronavirus pandemic as demise counts rise and the world wide economy stays sluggish.

“President Biden will target on a world wide reaction to the Covid pandemic, such as coordination on vaccine creation, distribution, and supplies, as nicely as continued efforts to mobilize and cooperate towards the danger of rising infectious diseases by creating place capacity and setting up well being stability funding,” the White House mentioned Sunday.

Friday’s meeting will be the 1st G-seven collecting due to the fact April 2020. It will be hosted by British Key Minister Boris Johnson. In addition to the U.S., the G-seven features France, Japan, Germany, Italy, the U.K. and Canada.

The White House mentioned Mr. Biden would also target on the world wide economic recovery “including the relevance of all industrialized countries retaining economic aid for the recovery and collective actions to construct again far better.…President Biden will also discuss the have to have to make investments to strengthen our collective competitiveness and the relevance of updating world wide policies to deal with economic difficulties this sort of as those people posed by China.”

Mr. Biden will also elevate fears about weather modify, the White House mentioned. The Feb. 19 virtual meeting arrives forward of a prepared G-seven summit in June.