Macron: 'Critical' situation due to virus variants

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday the pandemic is at a "critical" stage because of the new variants of the coronavirus that were being detected.

Macron was speaking from Paris during a virtual meeting with the co-founders of the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator - a global collaboration to end the disease.

The Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator was launched by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and other international organisations in April 2020 to give equitable access to tests, vaccines and treatments in poorest countries.

Macron called for ACT-A participants to deliver vaccines urgently to low-income countries, explaining that, if not, "it will give a window of opportunity" for more variants to develop and affect high-income countries in the coming months.

"In a nutshell, this is a duty and this is even in the interest of a lot of developed countries to fix this situation," Macron said.

Earlier this week, Macron had a call with WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, on these issues.

Macron is notably pushing for pharmaceutical companies to do technology transfers that would allow developing countries to produce vaccines themselves, which would help increase global production and decrease costs for the poorest countries.