'China had thousands more coronavirus deaths than reported'
President Donald Trump asserted that thousands more people have died from the coronavirus in China compared to the Beijing government has acknowledged, without citing any evidence.
"They lost thousands of people," Trump said within an interview with Fox News's Laura Ingraham that was broadcast on Tuesday night, reports Bloomberg.
"They lost a lot more than any other country, they just don't report it." China has reported 4,724 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University - far less than the 184,644 deaths in the US, which has the highest number in the world.
Trump has been escalating his attacks on China as he trails Democrat Joe Biden in polls before the November election and surveys show Americans disapprove of the president's handling of the crisis. When Ingraham asked Trump how he knows the amount of virus deaths in China, he changed the topic.
"And by the way, I saw a statistic that came out the other day talking about only 6 % of the persons actually died from Covid, that is a very interesting," he said without providing any evidence or detail.Trump may have been discussing data posted on the united states Centres for Disease Control and Prevention website saying "for 6 % of deaths, Covid-19 was the only cause mentioned."
But that will not mean the other deaths were not due to the coronavirus. Lots of the remaining deaths listed factors like respiratory failure that are triggered by the virus.Other persons had conditions like obesity and diabetes, which can worsen the virus' effects.The president last weekend re-tweeted a supporter of the unfounded QAnon conspiracy theory who cited the 6 % figure to argue that the united states death rate was inflated, but the tweet was later deleted.
"There are 180,000-plus deaths - are real deaths from Covid-19. Let there not be any confusion about this," Anthony Fauci, the country's leading infectious disease expert, said on ABC's HELLO America Tuesday when asked about Trump's re-tweet.
Ingraham followed up in the Fox interview by saying the numbers show that the occurrence of co-morbidities still means Covid-19 might have been the "key" element in a patient's death."It could be. But it's a fascinating statistic," the president responded.
