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Trump's Misleading COVID-19 Comparisons to Other Countries - FactCheck.org

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In a flurry of tweets and remarks, President Donald Trump continued to distort the facts on the coronavirus pandemic:Trump, July 30:Adjusted for population, only Israel is similar to the U.S. in terms of new COVID-19 cases, and had a slightly higher seven-day average figure than the U.S. on July 30. As of Aug. 4, Israel has dipped below the U.S.; Australia has more than nine times fewer new cases per capita than the U.S. and Japan has more than 16 times fewer cases, &nbsp;Our World in Data’s seven-day rolling average.In an Aug. 3 , the president again noted “As of Aug. 4, the U.S. had a mortality rate of 47.5 per 100,000 people, but Australia (0.93), Japan (0.8), South Korea (0.58) all have mortality rates of less than 1 person per 100,000,&nbsp;&nbsp;Johns Hopkins.In that aired Aug. 3, Trump objected to focusing on deaths as a proportion of the population, pointing instead to deaths as a proportion of total cases. “You have to go by the cases,” he said, claiming that the statistic showed the U.S. is “lower than Europe.”The U.S. has a case-fatality rate of 3.3%, lower than many countries in Europe, including France, Spain and Germany. But there are also many countries with lower rates than the U.S., including Australia (1.2%), Japan (2.5%), Israel (0.7%) and South Korea (2.1%).That measure shows how deadly the disease has been for those who have been identified as infected, but looking at deaths per 100,000 population shows how the disease has affected the total population of a country.Fauci on Europe’s ShutdownThe president also claimed in a tweet that Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was “wrong” in saying in that more restrictive lockdowns in European countries led to a sharper decline in cases than what the U.S. has achieved. Trump falsely claimed the difference was due to testing. “We have more cases because we have tested far more than any other country,” he said.Wrong! We have more cases because we have tested far more than any other country, 60,000,000. If we tested less, there would be less cases. How did Italy, France &amp; Spain do? Now Europe sadly has flare ups. Most of our governors worked hard &amp; smart. We will come back STRONG!::— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)In the congressional hearing, Fauci was asked by , chairman of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, “why Europe has largely contained the virus” while “the United States has seen a continued rise in new cases?” Clyburn showed a chart of the daily new confirmed coronavirus cases per million people for the U.S. and Europe.Fauci, July 31:But take a look at what happened to our baseline, we came up, down and then we plateaued at about 20,000 cases a day. So, we started off with a very difficult baseline of transmission that was going on at the time that we tried to open up the country.Fauci went on to say that some states reopened “very well” and others didn’t, and the latter “led to the surging that you’re showing on your chart there. And one of the reasons is not doing some of the things that [CDC Director] Dr. Redfield mentioned in his opening statement, universal wearing of masks, avoiding crowds, forced physical distancing, et cetera, et cetera. So it’s a complicated reason why those charts are that way and hopefully as we’re going forward we can turn those around and I do believe we can.”Here’s a version of the chart Clyburn showed:Trump’s alternative explanation for the difference — “We have more cases because we have tested far more than any other country” — reminded us of the president’s claim in a July “Fox News Sunday” interview that other countries, later mentioning Europe,“tests per confirmed case provides an indication of how aggressively a country is testing. And many countries are at much higher rates than the US.”As of Aug. 3, the U.S. had conducted 12.3 tests per confirmed case of COVID-19, using . That’s fewer tests per case than 20-some European countries, with the exclusion of France and Sweden – though the available information for those two countries dates back to early July and May.Among the countries the president has recently mentioned, Spain has conducted 16.3 tests per confirmed case as of July 30, and Germany has done 39 as of July 26. Israel (26.4), Japan (22.3) and Australia (244.8) all have conducted more tests per confirmed case.Testing Not Sole Cause of Increase in CasesTrump once again made the misleading claim, in , that coronavirus cases in the U.S. have gone .” As , increased testing will lead to more cases, but it doesn’t account for all of the uptick in some parts of the country. The percentage of tests that were positive also went up in many states.When we looked into this issue in June,&nbsp;Florida had a 5% positivity rate or lower for nearly all of May, but for most of July into August, . In Texas, the was around 5% at the end of May, hit nearly 18% in July and was about 12% to 14% in recent days.As of Aug. 4, Johns Hopkins University in the seven-day positivity rate.Trump chooses to focus instead on states that are below 5%. He in an Aug. 3 press briefing: “Meanwhile, 18 states continue to have very low case numbers and low test positivity rates under 5%,” mentioning Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, New Jersey and New York, among others.Two members of the White House’s coronavirus task force also have contradicted Trump’s claims about testing. Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator of the task force, on Aug. 2 that the U.S. was in a “new phase” of the outbreak and that the virus was “more widespread.”“What we are seeing today is different from March and April. It is extraordinarily widespread. It’s into the rural as equal urban areas,” Birx said.&nbsp;“To everybody who lives in a rural area, you are not immune or protected from this virus.”She recommended those in multigenerational households in areas where there is an outbreak “consider wearing a mask at home, assuming that you’re positive, if you have individuals in your households with comorbidities.”(Trump that after being by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Birx “took the bait &amp; hit us. Pathetic!”)Fauci in that July 31 hearing: “We see, if you do more testing, you’re going to see more cases. But the increases that we’re seeing are real increasing in cases, as also reflected by increasing in hospitalization and increasing in deaths.”The seven-day rolling average of deaths per million people in the United States , from less than or around 2 in late June and early July to 3.38 on July 31, the day Fauci made his remarks, according to Our World in Data.Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through&nbsp;our “” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, 202 S. 36th St., Philadelphia, PA 19104.Ask SciCheckQ. Are vaccinated and boosted people more susceptible to infection or disease with the omicron variant than unvaccinated people?A. No. Getting vaccinated increases your protection against COVID-19. Sometimes, certain raw data can suggest otherwise, but that information cannot be used to determine how well a vaccine works.Have a question?

In a flurry of tweets and remarks, President Donald Trump continued to distort the facts on the coronavirus pandemic:Trump, July 30:Adjusted for population, only Israel is similar to the U.S. in terms of new COVID-19 cases, and had a slightly higher seven-day average figure than the U.S. on July 30. As of Aug. 4, Israel has dipped below the U.S.; Australia has more than nine times fewer new cases per capita than the U.S. and Japan has more than 16 times fewer cases, &nbsp;Our World in Data’s seven-day rolling average.In an Aug. 3 , the president again noted “As of Aug. 4, the U.S. had a...

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