Trump made 33 false claims about the coronavirus crisis in the first two weeks of March

Source: CNN

Trump made 33 false claims about the coronavirus crisis in the first two weeks of March

By Daniel Dale and Tara Subramaniam, CNN
Updated 2259 GMT (0659 HKT) March 22, 2020

Washington (CNN) — President Donald Trump began March with a barrage of false claims about the coronavirus pandemic -- understating the extent of the crisis, overstating the availability of tests, inaccurately blaming his predecessor and wrongly insisting that the crisis was unforeseen.

Trump made 50 false claims from March 2 through March 8, then 21 false claims from March 9 through March 15. Of those 71 false claims, 33 were related to the coronavirus. That is on top of some additional misleading claims from Trump about the coronavirus (we only count the false claims here), plus some false and misleading claims from members of his administration.

Trump is now averaging about 57 false claims per week since we started counting at CNN on July 8, 2019. From that date through March 15, he has made 2,062 false claims in all.

The most egregious false claim: The availability of coronavirus tests

On March 6, as doctors and health officials around the country were reporting a shortage of coronavirus tests, Trump said, "Anybody that wants a test can get a test. That's what the bottom line is."

In reality, Americans needed authorization from a doctor to get tested -- and even many people who did have a doctor's order could not get access.

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Read more: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/22/politics/fact-check-trump-coronavirus-false-claims-march/index.html