World coronavirus Dispatch: 'Painful' US experience, dubious China figures

From some scary new death toll projections coming from the US to a tobacco maker's bid to produce vaccines and Saudi planning to postpone hajj, read these and more in today's international dispatch

US President Donald Trump has warned that the next two weeks will be painful, as new projections by experts fix the potential death toll at 240,000. This is despite stringent social-distancing measures being followed in the country.

“We’re going through the worst thing that the country’s probably ever seen,” Trump said.

Elsewhere, there is growing scepticism around the official pandemic numbers reported from China, which added only 68 new cases yesterday.

Residents of Wuhan, where the virus originated, have dismissed official figures. Most people believe deaths could be