US President Donald Trump responded with fury to accusations he did not act quickly enough to contain the coronavirus outbreak, showing journalists at his daily briefing an anti-media "propaganda video” of “fake news” reports.

Mr Trump cut to a White House-produced video during Monday's press conference in an attempt to shame media organisations for critical coverage of his response.

"Everything we did was right," said a furious Mr Trump, blaming state governors and others for the country's setbacks.

He appeared to reserve particular anger for the New York Times, which reported over the weekend that the Trump administration was issued early warnings about the coronavirus that were ignored.

The president said he wanted to share the presentation, which was produced by the White House's social media director “because we're getting fake news and I'd like to have it corrected.”

The president showed journalists at his daily coronavirus briefing “anti-media propaganda video” of “fake news” reports. credit: CNN

The bizarre video also featured favourable Fox News reports and a number of statements from governors, including California’s Gavin Newsom and New York’s Andrew Cuomo, praising the Trump administration's leadership on the pandemic.

“They're saying what a great job we're doing,” Mr Trump said of the governors' comments.

Jonathan Karl, a reporter with ABC News, told the president that he had never seen what looked to be a “campaign-style” video played in the White House briefing room.

One media pundit called Mr Trump’s attacks on the media “breathtaking”. Jim Acosta, chief White House correspondent for CNN, said it was the “biggest meltdown of a president of the United States" he had seen in his career.

Prominent news channels including CNN made the unusual decision to cut away from their live feeds of the briefing, returning only when the video had finished playing.

CNN ran chyrons reading “Angry Trump uses propaganda video made by government employees at taxpayers’ expense.”

Shortly before the president’s unprecedented diatribe, Mr Trump brought up Dr Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top coronavirus expert, to discuss an interview he gave to CNN over the weekend in which he appeared to criticise the government’s slow response.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases told the channel that shutting the country down sooner could have saved lives, but cautioned that a number of factors were involved.

Dr Fauci, speaking from the podium, explained that he used a poor choice of words when he said that earlier mitigation would have saved lives, as Mr Trump looked on.

There was speculation earlier in the day that Dr Fauci, who has served under a number of presidents in his 35 years as director of the NIAID, may be fired by the president.

One journalist asked the immunologist whether he had been forced to address the briefing on the matter.

Mr Trump may have been angered by the latest polls, which show his approval rating dropping to a six-month low of 43 per cent as the coronavirus crisis drags on and unemployment mounts to over 16 million.

Some polls during the public health crisis have shown Americans trust him more than Mr Trump.