WASHINGTON, Jan. 14 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday unveiled a 1.9-trillion-dollar COVID-19 relief bill, which includes another round of direct payments to individuals, aid for state and local governments, increased unemployment benefits, as well as more funding for testing and vaccine distribution.

Calling the recently approved 900-billion-dollar bipartisan relief package "an important first step," Biden said in a speech in Wilmington, Delaware Thursday night that "we need more action, more bipartisanship, and we need to move fast."

"Just as we are in the midst of a dark winter of this pandemic as cases, hospitalizations, and deaths spike at record levels, there is real pain overwhelming the real economy," the president-elect said in the speech to the nation.