United States President Donald Trump has admitted that American fatalities from coronavirus could reach eighty to ninety thousand – a figure much higher than he earlier predicted.

The US death toll from the virus has reached staggering proportions, with the country reaching a sobering milestone of 65 thousand deaths as of the 3rd of May.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, Anthony Fauci, responded to a question from a reporter about whether Americans should prepare for such a high predicted number of casualties and if the US should have started social distancing sooner.

“As sobering a number as that is, we should be prepared for it,” Dr Fauci acknowledged.

“If there was no virus in the background then there was nothing to mitigate. If there was virus there that we didn’t know about then the answer to your question is probably, yes.”

President Trump defended his handling of the pandemic, saying it would have been worse if the US had decided ride it out.

“Two point two million people would have died if we did nothing and just carried on our life.”

With his originally stated plans of the US economy being back on its feet by Easter, critics believe that President Trump gave the country a false sense of hope.

But he denied lulling Americans into a false sense of security.

“I want to give people hope too, you know I’m a cheerleader for the country, we’re going through the worst thing the country has probably ever seen,” he said.

“Don’t forget at that time people didn’t know much about it, even the experts – we were talking about it but we didn’t know where it was going; we saw China, but that was it.”

Other countries are also facing huge death tolls due to the horrific virus, and Americans are being told to prepare for tough weeks to come.