Global leaders joined the World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday to launch an initiative to accelerate work on drugs, tests and vaccines against COVID-19 and to share them around the world.

French President Emmanuel Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen were among leaders taking part in a video conference to announce the plan.

According to the WHO, the initiative aims to make technologies against the disease caused by the novel coronavirus "accessible to everyone who needs them, worldwide."

"The world needs these tools and needs them fast," WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said as the virtual meeting got under way. "We are facing a common threat which we can only defeat with a common approach."

The WHO said late on Thursday it would announce a "landmark collaboration" on Friday to speed up development of safe, effective drugs, tests and vaccines to prevent, diagnose and treat COVID-19, the lung disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

A spokesman for the U.S. mission in Geneva told Reuters before the meeting that the United States would not be involved.

"There will be no U.S. official participation," he said in an email reply to a query. "We look forward to learning more about this initiative in support of international cooperation to develop a vaccine for COVID-19 as soon as possible."