Trump's handling of COVID-19 pandemic and feuds with reporters grab headlines

Donald Trump's handling of the coronavirus pandemic crisis and his rude remarks at reporters questioning his contempt for science and disdain for experts have grabbed headlines in the American media, with a leading newspaper even going to the extent of terming him as the worst president in US history.

According to a report in the CNN, Trump gets increasingly defensive and short-tempered during the daily briefings and refuses to listen to questions about shortcomings in the federal government's efforts in dealing with the pandemic that has claimed over 12,700 lives in the country and infected 1,38,000 people.

On Monday, Trump rubbished a report by an experienced Health and Human Services Department watchdog official about supply shortages at hospitals all over the country, claiming it was politically motivated.

Trump's feuds with the reporters are wide open during his media briefings over the coronavirus situation and his claims of a hugely successful leadership in tackling the worst domestic crisis.

On being questioned over the lack of testing of the disease, Trump replied, "we are the federal government. We are not supposed to stand on street corners during testing," he said.

According to a report in The Guardian, critics close to the president have recently been alleging that the country's top infectious disease expert and Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci is recklessly damaging the economy, preventing the use of supposed wonder treatments like hydroxychloroquine, and now, mid-pandemic, some of them appear to be calling for his job.

Over the weekend, one of Trump's economic advisers -- Peter Navarro -- clashed with Fauci over the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine, the drug the President insists could save COVID-19 patients, according to people familiar with the disagreement, the CNN report said.

A report in The New York Times said that Trump is not rising to the challenge of the coronavirus pandemic and he's shrivelling into nothingness.

"Americans are dying by the thousands, and he gloats about what a huge, rapt television audience he has. They're confronting financial ruin and not sure how they'll continue to pay for food and shelter, and he reprimands governors for not treating him with adequate adulation," the article said.

As per the report in the Washington Post, Trump, with his catastrophic mishandling of the coronavirus, has established himself as the worst president in US history.

"The Trump administration received its first formal notification of the outbreak of the coronavirus in China on January 3. Within days, US spy agencies were signalling the seriousness of the threat to trump by including a warning about the coronavirus- the first of many- in the president's daily brief." But Trump wasn't listening, the report said.

However, Trump dubbed The New York Times and the Washington Post as the fake news sources of information.

In a tweet on Monday, he said, "advertising in the Failing New York Times is WAY down. The Washington Post is not much better. I can't say whether this is because they are Fake News sources of information, to a level that few can understand, or the Virus is just plain beating them up.