Play video content Exclusive TMZ.com

Dr. Drew's beyond fed up with the media coverage of the coronavirus because he believes it's majorly overblown and causing hysteria ... while another major threat's being ignored.

The doctor was outside Beauty & Essex restaurant in L.A. Wednesday night went he went off on the media for misreporting the coronavirus, and even worse ... failing to point out facts in order to alleviate some of the panic.

According to Dr. Drew -- who was leaving sports agent Darren Prince's 50th bday bash -- coronavirus should be reported as being widespread, BUT, much milder of a virus than everyone is freaking out about. As he points out, there are tens of thousands of people infected ... but only a few hundred deaths.

By comparison, roughly 60,000 people die from the flu each year in the U.S. alone ... and it can be as high as 646,000 on average worldwide!!!

So, it's safe to say Dr. Drew's right when he says influenza is way more of a killer than the coronavirus ... so you should get your flu shot. We know Dr. Oz agrees too.

Play video content 2/1/2020 TMZ.com

To be fair, though ... Dr. Drew's numbers are a couple hundred short when it comes to coronavirus deaths. So far, 563 have died -- all but 2 in China -- and there's more than 28,000 cases across the globe.