Trump denies playing COVID-19, contradicting his taped interview

President Donald Trump denies downplaying coronavirus, despite a recorded interview where he admitted otherwise.

In an ABC event yesterday, President Trump said he "up-played" the virus which contradicts an interview that he had with Bob Woodward, the famous journalist, earlier this year.

The taped comments from the interview show Mr Trump saying that he purposefully minimised the seriousness of COVID-19 to avoid public panic.

He said: "I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down, because I don't want to create a panic."

Mr Woodward, known for breaking the story about the Watergate scandal in 1972, interviewed Mr Trump in February where he revealed that know more about the severity of COVID-19 than he had admitted to the public.

During his speech at a town hall meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Mr Trump also said that a vaccine could be ready "within weeks".

This comes despite doubts from health experts, as no vaccine has completed clinical trials yet.

Some scientists worry, as the presidential election edges closer, that such comments could have been made to benefit the political sphere rather than the health and safety of US citizens.

Mr Trump called his actions against coronavirus "very strong". Referencing his travel ban on China and Europe in February and March this year, he said: "We would have lost thousands of more people had I not put the ban on. We saved a lot of lives when we did that,"

The Scientific American, a US magazine, released a statement on Tuesday saying that the president did not "develop a national strategy to provide protective equipment, coronavirus testing or clear health guidelines" despite warnings as early as January and February.

According to data from Johns Hopkins University, COVID-19 related deaths in the US has surpassed 195,000 people.