Former US president Donald Trump has lashed out at two of the country's leading figures in the coronavirus battle after they criticised his handling of the pandemic, according to AFP.

In an angry statement, Trump described Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx as “two self-promoters trying to reinvent history to cover for their bad instincts and faulty recommendations, which I fortunately almost always overturned”.

Trump accused Fauci, who leads the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, of trying to take credit for vaccine development, and “moving the goalposts to make himself look as good as possible”.

The former president added that Birx, who was his coronavirus task force coordinator, was “a proven liar with very little credibility left".