Trump continues to refuse to accept the deadliness of the coronavirus pandemic
The best known comment President Trump made during his Feb. 28 campaign rally in South Carolina was that criticism of his handling of the quietly spreading coronavirus in the United States was a “hoax” being perpetrated by his Democratic opponents. But in retrospect, Trump’s most telling remarks that evening — two months ago Tuesday — were about the threat the virus might pose to his constituents.
“Thirty-five thousand people on average die each year from the flu. Did anyone know that?” Trump said to the crowd. “Thirty-five thousand, that’s a lot of people. It could go to 100,000. It could be 20,000. They say usually a minimum of 27, goes up to 100,000 people a year die — and so far we have lost nobody to coronavirus in the United States.”
“Nobody,” he added. “And it doesn’t mean we won’t, and we are totally prepared. It doesn’t mean we won’t. But think of it, you hear 35 and 40,000 people, and we’ve lost nobody. You wonder if the press is in hysteria mode.”
That didn’t hold for long. The next day, Trump held his second briefing on the novel coronavirus in the White House press briefing room.
“Unfortunately, one person passed away overnight,” Trump said. “She was a wonderful woman — a medically high-risk patient in her late fifties.”
The first death was actually a man; the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would later take responsibility for Trump’s misstatement. More important was how quickly the presentation Trump made to his supporters crumbled. That man in Washington state died hours after Trump publicly hailed the lack of any fatalities as a sign of how well his administration was doing.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-continues-to-refuse-to-accept-the-deadliness-of-the-coronavirus-pandemic/ar-BB13jZ2z?li=BBnbcA1&ocid=hplocalnews
