More Americans have grown critical of President Donald Trump over the past month as the death toll mounts from the coronavirus pandemic and he now trails Democratic challenger Joe Biden by eight percentage points among registered voters, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll released on Tuesday. 

The poll conducted on Monday and Tuesday showed that 41 percent of U.S. adults approved of Trump's performance in office, which is down four points from a similar poll that ran in mid-April. Fifty-six percent disapprove of Trump, up by five points in the same span. 

It also found that 46 percent of registered voters said they would back Biden in the November 3 presidential election, while 38 percent would vote for Trump. That compared with a two-point Biden lead in Reuters/Ipsos polling last week. 

Americans also appear to be increasingly critical of the way Trump has handled the health crisis. According to the poll, those who disapprove of Trump's performance at the helm of the country's pandemic response outnumber those who approve by 13 percentage points – the highest level of net disapproval since the poll started asking the question at the beginning of March. 

Trump initially downplayed the threat of the virus that has killed more than 80,000 people in the United States, the highest death toll of any country. He has sometimes contradicted disease specialists in his administration, promoted potential treatments that were not found effective and has accused Democratic governors of reopening their states slowly in order to hurt his re-election chances. 

The Republican president has defended his administration's handling of the crisis and has accused China of failing to alert the world to the severity and scope of the outbreak – an allegation the Beijing has strongly denied and slammed Washington for blame-shifting.

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Biden has routinely led Trump among polls of registered voters this year. But his lead had been steadily eroding until this week. 

The public sees Trump as the stronger candidate for job creation, while Biden is seen as better suited on healthcare issues. The poll showed that the public was split over which candidate would be better for dealing with the coronavirus response. 

The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted online, in English, throughout the United States. It gathered responses from 1,112 American adults, including 973 who identified as registered voters. It had a credibility interval, a measure of precision, of plus or minus four percentage points.

Trump is under criticism for his administration's delay in responding to the pandemic, blame-shifting and his refusal to wear a mask in public. 

Last month, an investigative report by The Washington Post said Trump's denial and delayed response in the critical first 70 days of the outbreak had caused the U.S. to suffer through a situation that could have been mitigated with decisive action. 

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On the other hand, the Trump administration tends to blame China for problems in the U.S. to cover up its own poor handling of the pandemic, Chinese officials said, urging Washington to focus on tackling the coronavirus at home and saving American lives.

According to a report by Politico in late April, the National Republican Senatorial Committee sent campaigns a memo authored by a top Republican strategist advising GOP candidates to address the coronavirus crisis by aggressively attacking China.

The detailed, 57-page memo includes guiding candidates how to deflect public anger on racism to the "cover-up" of the Chinese government and to tie Democratic candidates to the Chinese government, accusing them of being "soft on China." 

The U.S. president tried to shift the focus to China again at Monday's COVID-19 briefing after a CBS News reporter asked him why when Americans were losing their lives did he keep insisting that the U.S. was doing better than other countries when it came to testing. 

"Well, they're losing their lives everywhere in the world," Trump said. "And maybe that's a question you should ask China. Don't ask me, ask China that question, OK?"

Despite the fact that the U.S. is leading the world in both coronavirus infections and fatalities, Trump has not been wearing a mask in public. He did not wear one during a tour to a Honeywell International Inc in Arizona last week and continued to be bare-faced at Monday's press briefing even after several officials at the White House were infected. 

A report by the Associated Press suggested that Trump's refusal to wear a mask is because of fears that it would "send the wrong message" and harm his re-election chances, citing anonymous officials from the Trump administration and his campaign team. 

Trump is afraid that wearing a mask would make it seem like he is preoccupied with health instead of focused on reopening the American economy – which his aides believe is the key to his re-election chances, the officials said.

"It's a vanity thing, I guess, with him," U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi commented. 

(With input from Reuters)