President Donald Trump is suggesting the state of New York may have inflated coronavirus death toll statistics.
During Wednesday’s White House Coronavirus Task Force briefing, Trump was asked about the seemingly flawed coronavirus statistics.
The president criticized New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio for the additional 3,700 victims who had coronavirus listed as their “apparent” cause of death despite not being tested for the virus. On Wednesday, New York’s statewide death toll soared over 10,000.
Trump noted that some of the death reports were written to suggest other health-related conditions were made worse by the onset of coronavirus symptoms.
“I see this morning where New York added 3,000 deaths because they died. And they’re now saying rather than it was a heart attack, they’re saying it was a heart attack caused by this so they’re adding,” Trump said.
Check out Trump’s remarks below:
When reporters asked Trump about the 27,000-plus death toll, nationwide, he again referenced New York saying the additional deaths were added “just in case” the deceased person had the coronavirus.
“If you look at it, that’s it. Everything we have is documented and reported great. What they are doing is, just in case, they’re calling it this — that’s okay. But we have more cases because we do more reporting.”
Shortly after the press briefing, Freddi Goldstein —de Blasio’s spokesperson— fired back at the president in the mayor’s defense, accusing him of minimizing the lives of coronavirus victims.
“These were people with names, hobbies, lives. They leave behind grieving loved ones. They deserve to be recognized, not minimized,” Goldstein said.
Approximately 90% of the confirmed coronavirus deaths occurred in hospitals while 60% of the unconfirmed coronavirus cases were also reported from hospitals.
As of Thursday morning, New York has more than 213,000 coronavirus cases and a death toll of more than 11,000 deaths.