Washington [US], October 16 (ANI): Former US Vice President Joe Biden hit out at the Donald Trump administration saying that the President panicked about the Coronavirus outbreak in the country.

"The President was informed about how dangerous this virus was. We learned that he knew well how serious it was when he did an interview with Bob Woodward and at the time he said he didn't tell anybody because he was afraid Americans would panic--Americans don't panic, he panicked and didn't say a word to anybody," Biden said during his town hall at Philadelphia.

"He didn't talk about what needed to be done because he kept worrying, in my view, about the stock market. He worried if he talked about how bad this could be, unless we took these precautionary actions, then, in fact, the market would go down. And his barometer of the success of the economy is the market," he added.

Speaking about the vaccine, he responded saying, "Trump talks about things that are not accurate."

"If the body of scientists say (it's ready) and it's been tested, it's gone through the three phases - yes, I would take and I would encourage people to take it. But President Trump is saying things like injecting bleach on your arms," the former US Vice President said in response to a vaccine-related question.

As per the latest updates by Johns Hopkins University, the US -- which is the worst affected country from the virus -- has a total of 7,975,725 COVID-19 cases and the highest death toll in the world with 217,746 deaths. (ANI)