Donald Trump says country with most covid-19 deaths 'has to be China'

18 April 2020, 08:46 | Updated: 1 September 2020, 10:22

Donald Trump has said he believes that China's death toll is higher than that of the US
Donald Trump has said he believes that China's death toll is higher than that of the US. Picture: PA

By Asher McShane

Donald Trump has insisted deaths from Covid-19 are much higher in China than in the US, despite official statistics painting a far different picture.

China has more than four times the population of the US but has reported far fewer deaths, around 4,600 compared with more than 32,000 in the United States as of late Friday afternoon. However China has faced criticism over a lack of openness with their statistics, with experts saying their death toll is much higher than what has been reported.

"When I listen to the press every night saying we have the most (deaths) - we don't have the most in the world," Mr Trump told Friday's White House briefing.

"The most in the world has to be China. It's a massive country. It's gone through a tremendous problem with this, a tremendous problem. And they must have the most."

READ MORE: Follow the latest coronavirus developments live

The full reality is difficult to know.

Mr Trump has routinely manipulated numbers and information to make the US response to the coronavirus pandemic look better than it is. China's secretive leadership obscured the severity of the crisis for crucial weeks, and its numbers remain in question.

It is also certain that deaths from the virus have not been fully reported in either country because the pandemic is still raging in the US and still being accounted for in China.

Even so, in a tweet on Friday, Mr Trump flipped a striking disparity on its head to boast: "China has just announced a doubling in the number of their deaths from the Invisible Enemy. It is far higher than that and far higher than the US, not even close!"

Even with China's upward revision of its deaths on Friday - which was not a doubling, as Mr Trump claimed - the recorded US death toll is some seven times higher than China's, according to the latest count by Johns Hopkins University.

For China to surpass the US in this lethal count, it would have to be under-reporting deaths by the tens of thousands, and deaths in the U.S. would have to nosedive from the current trend and projections.

Listen & subscribe: Global Player | Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify

A scientific model that US public-health authorities have repeatedly cited, from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, now projects more than 60,000 Covid-19 deaths in the US by August. Its worst-case scenario is for more than 140,000 deaths by then.

These projections assume current social distancing is maintained until infections are minimised and the spread is contained.

China on Friday reported 4,632 deaths in total, up from 3,342, a spike due largely to previously uncounted deaths in Wuhan, the city where human infection by the coronavirus is believed to have started.

A group to review the numbers was established in late March. It looked at data from more sources than at the height of the pandemic there as it collected information from fever clinics, temporary hospitals, quarantine sites, prisons, elderly care centres and other places. People who died at home because hospitals had no room for them were counted, too.

Latest World News

See more Latest World News

Shocking footage showed the stage at the iconic European dance festival in Boom, Belgium, engulfed in flames on Wednesday afternoon

Tomorrowland main stage destroyed by fire hours before festival start

As the news reporter is presenting - a huge explosion is captured erupting in the background.

Shocking moment Israeli airstrike blasts Syria military HQ on live TV as news reporter flees in terror

Smoke billows following Israeli strikes near the Syrian army and defence ministry headquarters in Damascus.

Israel warns 'painful blows will come' as it ramps up strikes on Syria and sends more troops to the border

A volcano in Iceland has erupted, leading to evacuations.

Iceland volcano erupts for 12th time since 2021, prompting evacuations from iconic Blue Lagoon spa

A man and a woman smile at the camera

Ghislaine Maxwell could use ‘government misconduct’ to challenge imprisonment

Thousands of starving Palestinians flock to an aid distribution centre in order to receive food package.

At least 19 die in crowd crush near Gaza aid distribution centre, says US and Israel-backed aid group

Taliban fighters display their flag on patrol in Kabul, Afghanistan (Rahmat Gul/AP)

Taliban claims it has had the 'kill list' for years and is hunting down Afghans named

Bradley Murdoch, the killer of British backpacker Peter Falconio has died after being moved to palliative care last month.

The killer of backpacker Peter Falconio has died without revealing the location of the Briton's remains

People search for their belongings amid the debris of destroyed houses in the aftermath of Israeli bombardment in Gaza City, on July 15, 2025.

Israeli strikes kill more than 90 Palestinians overnight, including 19 members of the same family

An Etihad Airways Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner.

India-bound Boeing forced to turn back mid-flight amid concerns over fuel switches

U.S. President Donald Trump meets with Mark Rutte, NATO's secretary general, at the White House

Trump announces weapons for Ukraine after he allegedly asked Zelenskyy whether they can hit Moscow

A 19-year-old worker sucked into an industrial meat grinder at Tina’s Burritos has died.

Teen sucked into meat grinder at California burrito factory dies as horrified colleagues watch on

Disney Dream is a cruise ship operated by Disney Cruise Line, part of The Walt Disney Company. Aerial view

Police reveal how girl, aged 5, fell overboard from Disney cruise ship before father saved her

Members of a search and rescue team embrace as they visit a memorial wall for flood victims, Sunday, July 13, 2025, in Kerrville, Texas.

Emergency workers suspend search for survivors of catastrophic flooding in Texas amid new severe weather warnings

Police personnel work at the site of an Air India plane crash in Ahmedabad, India, Friday, June 13, 2025.

Air India rules out mechanical fault on doomed flight 171 amid investigation into pilots' 'medical records'

A German backpacker was found alive in the remote outback after a car crash and head injury left her disoriented for 11 days.

Backpacker breaks silence after found alive following 12 days in Australian outback