The World Bank has issued an urgent call for $25 billion in further COVID-19 emergency financing to assist the world’s poorest nations tackle the challenges raised by the pandemic.

David Malpass, the World Bank’s president, spoke to finance ministers and central bank governors of the G20 major economies that he would lay out a supplemental financing package later this month to deputies of the International Development Association (IDA).

The package will include funds for testing kits, supportive treatment drugs, and stimulus to aid ailing sectors like tourism and aviation in the poorest nations on earth.

The International Development Association is the World’s Bank arm that assists the world’s poorest countries, most of which are located in sub-Saharan Africa.

The Washington based lender warned in September that the coronavirus pandemic could push more than 40 million people in the continent to extreme poverty.

Malpass also raised concerns about the increasing risk of “disorderly defaults” among low-income countries, and said that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund had proposed a joint action plan to assist those for the most heavily-indebted IDA countries.

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