Poll: Majority of Americans think Trump is doing poor job tackling Covid-19

A majority of Americans think that US President Donald Trump is doing a poor job tackling the coronavirus pandemic.

In a new PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll, 55% of Americans said that they disapproved of the president’s handling of the outbreak.

This shows an increase in disapproval, as in their previous poll in March, 49% said that they disapproved of Trump’s handling of the crisis.

The same poll found that most Americans don’t think it’s a good idea for people to return to work without further testing, despite a struggling economy.

Earlier this month, Trump urged states to begin taking measures to open up the economy against a background of huge losses on the stock market, more than 20m Americans filing for unemployment and a threat to the future of millions of businesses across the country.

In the weeks since the president first suggested an easing of measures, unemployment has risen to 30m in the US and the country has become the worst affected in the world, with positive cases of the virus now upwards of one million.

Trump has continued to discuss ending lockdowns and some states, such as Georgia and Tennessee, have already started to reopen their economies, by opening malls and hairdressers, and more are likely to follow suit and start easing measures in the next few weeks.

Despite unemployment figures and the partial reopening of some states, 65% of participants said that going back to work without further testing is a bad idea, 32% said it was a good idea and 3% were unsure.

When it came to reopening schools, the poll results showed an even greater opposition to the idea.

85% of participants said it was a bad idea for children to go back to school without further testing, 14% said it was a good idea, while 1% were unsure.

Earlier this week, California Governor Gavin Newsom said that the state plans on sending children back to school, once capabilities to test and trace for the virus are improved.

He told reporters that the new school year could be weeks away and said: “We are considering the prospect of an even earlier school year,” and added: “We need to start preparing for the physical changes in the schools.”

According to a tracking project hosted by Johns Hopkins University, there are now upwards of one million people who have tested positive for coronavirus in the US. The death toll has reached at least 61,005.