US President Donald Trump continued to romanticize the future of the coronavirus crisis on Monday, claiming that the “virus is receding”, despite public health officials warning of its extraordinary spread across the United States.
“We are beginning to see evidence of significant progress nationwide,” Trump said during a press conference at the White House. He added that there is “an encouraging sign, very encouraging, I have to add, that the virus is receding”. His comments focused on states with declining infection rates as opposed to those that the administration is monitoring for further outbreaks. “In hot spots across the South and West, we’ve seen slow improvements from their recent weekly peaks,” Trump continued. He also asserted that regions, where there have been flare-ups, will be “very much under control” very soon.
Trump’s remarks came just a day after Dr. Deborah Birx, coordinator of the White House Coronavirus Task Force cautioned that the US was entering a “new phase” of the pandemic as the virus became “extraordinarily widespread”. Birx also responded to criticism from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who said on Sunday that she had no confidence in Birx as an advisor to the President since she had delivered misleading information about the virus to please Trump, saying that she was always focused on utilizing data to implement better programs to save the most number of lives.
However, Birx’s comments immediately irked Trump, who criticized the public health official’s “pathetic” action of “taking the bait”, referring to Pelosi’s remarks, and “hitting us”.
The US has incurred more than 150,000 deaths and recorded an upwards of 4 million COVID-19 cases. Trump has consistently downplayed the severity of the virus, contradicted, and slammed his own public health experts and pressed for schools and businesses to reopen. On Monday, he continued to stress that the US was “doing really well” and that a “permanent lockdown” could not be a “viable path forward”, as it would cause more harm than good.
Trump Claims Virus is “Receding” Even as Death Toll Rises in the United States
The US has incurred more than 150,000 deaths and an upwards of 4 million COVID-19 cases.
August 4, 2020
President Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus on April 24 at the White House. SOURCE: POLITICO