To be fair, isn't every politician some form of a huckster - wanting to give out false hope even if it's a lie.
He's just a more heavily monitored/criticized one.
I'm sure every politician would love to go out and give hope right now. And part of me thinks it isn't a bad thing even though it's probably a bold face lie. The 24/7 Armageddon coverage on CNN does get old after a while.
For better or worse he does have a point. I'm sure many other leaders are thinking the same thing but they're not deranged enough to voice it. At some point if it does look like it's going to be an infinite bleed a decision will have to be made to live with it rather than put the entire world in deep freeze. I think it'll be the US that breaks ranks first if that is the situation.