Donald Trump has sought to heap praise on US medics confronting the coronavirus crisis, likening their response to scenes from a war movie and saying it was an “incredible thing” to watch.

In comments delivered in a briefing about the administration’s ongoing efforts against the disease, Mr Trump for for the first time, drew attention online for being seemingly out of tone with the events he was describing.

“It’s incredible. It’s no different than you watch the war movies – you watch the old clips of war, running up hills,” he said.

“And they’re and they’re putting the outfits on and they’re putting their masks and … it’s incredible.”

Later he added: “These people are incredible ... I just admire the attitude.”

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During the briefing, which came as the death toll in the US passed 10,000 and Mr Trump sent his best wishes to British prime minister Boris Johnson, after he was moved to intensive care in hospital, the president said he had spoken with Democratic frontrunner Joe Biden.

He said his conversation about Covid-19 with the former vice president had been “very nice”.

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“He gave me his point of view, and I fully understood that. And we just had a very friendly conversation, lasted probably 15 minutes. And it was really good,” he said.

He also said he and other officials would be regularly tested for the virus

“I think we’ll probably have maybe quite a few tests, it’s not the worst idea, you know the system of testing now is so quick and so easy,” he said.