(NEXSTAR/KRON4) — Facebook pulled down a post from the commander in chief on Tuesday after President Donald Trump falsely described the coronavirus as “far less lethal” than the seasonal flu.
A tweet containing the same claim was also hidden behind a Twitter-imposed label about false information. The original posting contained the following quote:
“Flu season is coming up! Many people every year, sometimes over 100,000, and despite the Vaccine, die from the Flu. Are we going to close down our Country? No, we have learned to live with it, just like we are learning to live with Covid, in most populations far less lethal!!!”
According to the Centers for Disease Control, in the 2018-2019 season there were 34,200 American deaths from influenza. As of October 2020, over 209,000 people have died in the U.S. alone from the coronavirus. The president’s tweet is now obscured by a message containing the following:
“This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules about spreading misleading and potentially harmful information related to COVID-19.”
The social media agencies took similar action in August when Trump falsely claimed that children were “almost immune” from the disease.
The president, who gets “as much free treatment as he desires from military doctors in the White House Medical Unit,” according to the Los Angeles Times, also tweeted that people should not be afraid of the coronavirus.
“Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life,” he tweeted when he announced his hospital discharge after three nights of medical care.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, however, maintained that the impact of COVID-19 should not be downplayed.
The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has spent the year warning of the risks as Trump continued to flip the script.
In response to Trump’s recent comments, Fauci said, “Obviously, the message should be that we should try as best we can to avoid infection. No matter who you are, how old you are or what your underlying condition is, we should not trivialize it.”
