EU leaders on Friday debated a giant post-coronavirus recovery plan as China raced to prevent a second wave that it said may have originally come from Europe.

The disease was meanwhile already present in Italy as far back as December, experts said, underscoring the difficulty of tracking and containing the pandemic.

But with the world trying to both limit the economic pain of Covid-19 even as it guards against a resurgence, top US expert Dr Anthony Fauci offered a ray of hope as he said he did not see America returning to fresh lockdown.

The disease has so far killed 450,000 people and infected 8.4 million people worldwide, as well as causing historic levels of economic disruption as countries and continents shut down to stop its spread.

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