MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president said Friday that U.S. President Donald Trump has promised Mexico will be able to buy 1,000 ventilators and other intensive-therapy equipment used in treating severe cases of COVID-19.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he spoke with Trump Friday about Mexico’s request to purchase the machines, relatively few of which are available in Mexico.
López Obrador wrote in his Twitter account that Trump “guaranteed me that by the end of this month we would 1,000, and we can acquire more.”
Me llamó el presidente Donald Trump para responder a la solicitud que le hicimos sobre la adquisición de ventiladores y equipo médico de terapia intensiva. pic.twitter.com/8yPLs3Ku4d
— Andrés Manuel (@lopezobrador_) April 17, 2020
Es un nuevo gesto de solidaridad con México.
Le planteé la posibilidad de encontrarnos en junio o julio para externarle personalmente nuestro agradecimiento y dar testimonio de la entrada en vigor del T-MEC.
Mi afecto a los paisanos y al pueblo estadounidense.— Andrés Manuel (@lopezobrador_) April 17, 2020
Mexico currently has 6,875 confirmed coronavirus cases and 546 deaths.
López Obrador called it a “new gesture of solidarity with Mexico” and said, “I made the proposal that we could meet in June or July to personally express our appreciation.”
“I send my affection to our countrymen and the people of the United States,” López Obrador wrote, referring to the millions of Mexican migrants who live in the United States,
Such a visit would be unusual, especially if it implied the Mexican leader would travel to the United States. López Obrador has eschewed trips abroad since he took office in December 2018.
The left-leaning López Obrador has made good relations with the United States the cornerstone of his foreign policy, and the relationship between the two leaders has been surprisingly warm, considering their ideological differences.
López Obrador has also gone to great lengths to help Trump on issues like migration, for example, by stopping migrant caravans and allowing migrants who apply for asylum in the United States to wait in Mexico.
