Donald Trump has said the UK’s initial approach to the coronavirus pandemic would have been ‘very catastrophic’ had Boris Johnson not decided to change tack.

The US president suggested the Prime Minister had looked to ‘ride out’ the virus in an approach that would have caused ‘a lot of death’.

Trump’s comments come as the UK’s coronavirus death toll jumped to 2,352 following another 563 deaths – the biggest daily increase since the outbreak began.

The president’s criticism appeared to be a reference to a plan for the UK to build up a so-called ‘herd immunity’.

Sir Patrick Vallance, the UK’s chief scientific adviser, told the BBC on March 13 that the ‘aim’ was to ‘not suppress (coronavirus) completely… to build up some kind of herd immunity so more people are immune to this disease’, while still reducing the peak number of infections to protect the NHS.

The concept would have seen the elderly and vulnerable sheltered from Covid-19 but those deemed fit would have been permitted to contract the illness in a bid to build up nationwide immunity from the killer bug.

But a week after the position was pushed in broadcast interviews, Mr Johnson – who tested positive for Covid-19 last week – put the UK on lockdown.

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The move followed expert modelling predicting Britain was on course to lose 250,000 people during the pandemic unless stringent measures were taken.

Speaking during a two-hour White House briefing on Tuesday, Mr Trump said: ‘A lot of people were saying, “Let’s just ride it out”.

‘This is not to be ridden out. Then you would have been looking at 2.2 million people (dying) in a relatively short period of time.

‘If you remember, they were looking at that concept – I guess it is a concept, if you don’t mind death, a lot of death.

‘But they were looking at that concept in the UK, remember? They were very much looking at it.

‘All of a sudden they went hard the other way because they started seeing things that weren’t good. They put themselves in a little bit of a problem.

‘Now Boris has tested positive and I hear – I hope – he’s going to be fine.

‘But in the UK they were looking at that – they have a name for it but we won’t even go by the name – (and) it would have been very catastrophic I think if that had happened.’

Despite his comments on the UK’s turnaround, little over a week ago, the President vowed ‘never to turn the country off’ and said the Covid-19 death toll was unlikely to be worse than for flu.

He then told reporters on Tuesday that coronavirus was ‘probably the worst thing the country has ever seen’ and predicted worse casualties than in the First World War for the US.

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