Donald Trump says nearly 1 lakh Americans will die due to coronavirus

New Delhi : The US President Donald Trump has changed his estimates and claimed that around 1 lakh Americans are likely to die from coronavirus by the end of this year.

The remarks came as Donald Trump addressed a two-hour virtual town hall broadcast by FOX News between forecasting a rapid recovery for the U.S. economy and casting blame for the pandemic's spread on China.

More than 1.1 million people have been tested positive to the COVID-19 infection in the US. 67,000 Americans have also died of it.

"We're going to lose anywhere from 75, 80 to 100,000 people. That's a horrible thing," said Trump, who as recently on Friday had said he hoped fewer than 100,000 Americans would die and earlier in the week had talked about 60,000 to 70,000 deaths.

Amid dropping number of coronavirus cases in the US, half of the nation has started working under the relaxed norms.

"We can't stay closed as a country (or) we're not gonna have a country left," Trump said.