EU: Pandemic measures to total about $5.85 trillion

The European Union’s top economy official says that the recovery measures the EU and its 27 member states have in the works to emerge from the pandemic total around $5.85 trillion

BRUSSELS -- The European Union's top economy official said Monday that the recovery measures the EU and its 27 member states have in the works to emerge from the pandemic total around $5.85 trillion. EU Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni told a European Parliament committee said that if comparisons are made with U.S. President Joe Biden's pandemic stimulus relief package, the EU can confidently stand next to to Washington when all efforts are counted together. “Measures taken until now from member states and the EU reach so far 4.8 trillion” euros, the Italian commissioner told legislators, sweeping aside criticism that authorities weren't doing enough compared with Washington. The EU has agreed to a common recovery fund package of 750 billion euros ($910 billion), plus a 1.1 trillion euro ($1.3 trillion) seven-year budget that will be strongly geared toward dealing with the unprecedented economic recession caused by COVID-19 that the bloc's 450 million citizens will have to overcome.