Washington, June 25: US President Donald Trump on Thursday called coronavirus (COVID-19) a "ChinaVirus". In a tweet, Donald Trump said media is not telling people that despite the maximum number of coronavirus cases in the United States, the mortality rate is declining. He also said that "greatest testing" has led to an increase in COVID-19 cases in the United States. Donald Trump Says He Urged US Health Officials to 'Slow' Down COVID-19 Testing to Find Fewer Cases.

"The number of ChinaVirus cases goes up, because of GREAT TESTING, while the number of deaths (mortality rate), goes way down. The Fake News doesn’t like telling you that!" Trump tweeted. Earlier, while tweeting about his interaction with Governors on stopping coronavirus, he had called the disease a "Chinese virus", and termed it an attempt at stigmatising the country.

Donald Trump Terms Coronavirus as "ChinaVirus":

Recently, Trump was criticised for saying that he was encouraging coronavirus response workers to slow down testing. According to Trump, 25 million people have been tested for COVID-19 in the US, which is why the total number of confirmed cases in the country is high. With 2,380,452 cases and 121,969 deaths, the US continues with the world's highest number of COVID-19 infections and fatalities as of Thursday.

"When you do testing to that extent, you are gonna find more people, you're gonna find more cases. So I said to my people slow the testing down please. They test and they test. We have tests that people don't know what's going on," Trump said during his first Presidential campaign rally amid the coronavirus pandemic at Tulsa, Oklahoma.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 25, 2020 11:03 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).