Photo By: CDC via AP

So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common Flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 9, 2020

COVID-19 has now killed more people than influenza did during the 2018-2019 flu season in the United States.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 34,200 people died last year during flu season. According to numbers tabulated by Worldometer , 39,651 people have died of the coronavirus at this article's time of writing.The rate of death for people with COVID-19 compared to the flu is also stark. According to the CDC, 35.5 million people likely got the flu last year. That is a death rate of only .1%.Coronavirus has infected, at least, 742,459 people in the United States. That means it has a death rate of over 5%, which is more than 50 times the flu if its current death rate holds.For months, the President has been downplaying COVID-19, its impact on the United States, and its seriousness as a virus. In February, President Trump claimed that people in the United States with the coronavirus were " getting better ."The same month, Mr. Trump stated , "When you have 15 people [with coronavirus], and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done."In March, the President further downplayed the coronavirus, telling people to "think about" the fact that the flu killed so many people:Now, unfortunately, it appears that coronavirus will kill tens of thousands more people than the flu did last year. In 2017-2018, the flu killed approximately 61,000 , the highest in the 2010s, and a number that the coronavirus will likely eclipse in May.