Trump criticised for saying that he wants to have churches 'packed' again by Easter Sunday

Donald Trump has been criticised after he shared the very optimistic target of Easter in the fight against coronavirus and that he hopes to see churches 'packed' for the holiday.

In a Fox News town hall on Tuesday evening, the president urged people to flock to their local churches on Easter Sunday, which, at the time of writing, is just 19 days away.

At a White House press conference he called the Easter target 'a beautiful timeline' and then later, speaking to Fox's Bill Hemmer, Trump called Easter a 'very special day for me.'

Easter is a very special day for me and I see it's sort of in that timeline that I'm thinking about. I say 'wouldn't it be great to have all those churches full.' You know, the churches essentially, aren't allowed to have much of a congregation. I watched a sermon online and that was great but it's never gonna be like being there. So I think Easter Sunday, you'll have packed churches all over the country and I think it'll be a beautiful time and I think it's just about the timeline that'll be right.

Needless to say, this is incredibly optimistic from the president and would go against what many experts are saying, who believe it could last for months. It would also be wildly irresponsible to have thousands of people piling into churches at this time, even if the virus has been miraculously wiped out in such a short amount of time.

The president's comments have been widely mocked and criticised, especially as the United States now has the third-highest number of confirmed cases outside of China and Italy.

At the time of writing, the CDC has confirmed more than 44,000 cases of coronavirus in the United States, which have resulted in 544 deaths.