WHO reports most virus cases in a day

The World Health Organization has expressed concern about the rising number of new coronavirus cases in poor countries, even as many rich nations have begun emerging from lockdown.

The global health body said 106,000 new cases of infections of the novel coronavirus had been recorded in the past 24 hours starting from Tuesday, the most in a single day since the outbreak began.

"We still have a long way to go in this pandemic," WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news conference Wednesday. "We are very concerned about rising cases in low and middle income countries."

The WHO has come under fire from US President Donald Trump, who accuses it of having mishandled the outbreak and of favouring China, where the virus is believed to have emerged late last year. This week Trump threatened to withdraw from the WHO and permanently withhold funding.

Tedros acknowledged receiving a letter from Trump, but declined to comment further.

Tedros said he was committed to accountability and would carry out a review into the response to the pandemic. Such a review was demanded by member states in a resolution this week that was passed by consensus, although the United States expressed reservations about some elements of it.

"I said it time and time again that WHO calls for accountability more than anyone. It has to be done and when it's done it has to be a comprehensive one," Tedros said of the review, while declining to say when it would start.