DONALD Trump's Health Secretary Tom Price has been forced out after he racked up a fortune in private jet flights.

Trump had backed his minister after Mr Price made 26 private flights since May costing $400,000 (£300,000) to the US public purse

Mr Price's trips cost more than $1m (£750,000), including the use of military planes, according to the website Politico.

Government officials are barred from taking private planes for business. Only those engaged in security matters are allowe to do so.

The White House said the US President had accepted his resignation.

Earlier, Mr Trump said he was 'not happy' with the expenses bill.

But he added: "He's a very fine man. We're going to make a decision sometime tonight. He's a very, very fine man."

Mr Price became the first member of the president's Cabinet to be pushed out in an administration that has seen several high-ranking White House aides ousted

A former GOP congressman from the Atlanta suburbs, Mr Price served just eight months.

Privately, the president has been telling associates in recent days his health chief had become a distraction and was overshadowing his tax overhaul agenda and undermining his campaign promise to "drain the swamp" of corruption, according to sources.

The flap prompted scrutiny of other Cabinet members' travel as the House Oversight and Government Reform committee launched a government-wide investigation of top political appointees, with other department heads scrambling to explain their own travel.

Mr Price's repayment of 51,887.31 dollars (£38,728.06) for his own travel costs and his public expression of regrets did not placate the White House.

The total travel cost, including the secretary's entourage, was unclear but it could amount to several hundred thousand dollars.

An orthopaedic surgeon turned politician, Mr Price rose to Budget Committee chairman in the House, where he was known as a fiscal conservative.

When Mr Price joined the administration, Trump touted him as a conservative policy expert who could write a new healthcare bill to replace the Obama-era Affordable Care Act.

However, Mr Price became more of a supporting player in the GOP's futile healthcare campaign while Vice President Mike Pence took the lead, particularly in dealing with the Senate.

The perception of Mr Price jetting around while GOP lawmakers laboured to repeal Obamacare raised eyebrows on Capitol Hill. Mr Price flew on military aircraft overseas.

Although much of Mr Trump's ire over the healthcare failure has been aimed at the Republican-controlled Congress, associates of the president said he also assigns some blame to Mr Price, who he believes did not do a good job of selling the GOP plan.

Pence protege Seema Verma has been mentioned as a possible successor to Mr Price.

Ms Verma already leads the Centres for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs health insurance programmes that cover more than 130 million Americans.

Another possible candidate is FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, who won some bipartisan support in his confirmation and is well-known in policy, government and industry circles.

Trump replaced Mr Price with Don J Wright, a deputy assistant secretary of health.