Posted on 10/08/2020 2:41:04 PM PDT by gattaca
Covid-19 has created a crisis throughout the world. This crisis has produced a test of leadership. With no good options to combat a novel pathogen, countries were forced to make hard choices about how to respond. Here in the United States, our leaders have failed that test. They have taken a crisis and turned it into a tragedy.
The magnitude of this failure is astonishing. According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering,1 the United States leads the world in Covid-19 cases and in deaths due to the disease, far exceeding the numbers in much larger countries, such as China. The death rate in this country is more than double that of Canada, exceeds that of Japan, a country with a vulnerable and elderly population, by a factor of almost 50, and even dwarfs the rates in lower-middle-income countries, such as Vietnam, by a factor of almost 2000. Covid-19 is an overwhelming challenge, and many factors contribute to its severity. But the one we can control is how we behave. And in the United States we have consistently behaved poorly.
Sign up for the Weekly Table of Contents email.
Each week, receive an email with links to the articles published in the current week's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. SIGN UP We know that we could have done better. China, faced with the first outbreak, chose strict quarantine and isolation after an initial delay. These measures were severe but effective, essentially eliminating transmission at the point where the outbreak began and reducing the death rate to a reported 3 per million, as compared with more than 500 per million in the United States. Countries that had far more exchange with China, such as Singapore and South Korea, began intensive testing early, along with aggressive contact tracing and appropriate isolation, and have had relatively small outbreaks. And New Zealand has used these same measures, together with its geographic advantages, to come close to eliminating the disease, something that has allowed that country to limit the time of closure and to largely reopen society to a prepandemic level. In general, not only have many democracies done better than the United States, but they have also outperformed us by orders of magnitude.
Why has the United States handled this pandemic so badly? We have failed at almost every step. We had ample warning, but when the disease first arrived, we were incapable of testing effectively and couldn’t provide even the most basic personal protective equipment to health care workers and the general public. And we continue to be way behind the curve in testing. While the absolute numbers of tests have increased substantially, the more useful metric is the number of tests performed per infected person, a rate that puts us far down the international list, below such places as Kazakhstan, Zimbabwe, and Ethiopia, countries that cannot boast the biomedical infrastructure or the manufacturing capacity that we have.2 Moreover, a lack of emphasis on developing capacity has meant that U.S. test results are often long delayed, rendering the results useless for disease control.
Although we tend to focus on technology, most of the interventions that have large effects are not complicated. The United States instituted quarantine and isolation measures late and inconsistently, often without any effort to enforce them, after the disease had spread substantially in many communities. Our rules on social distancing have in many places been lackadaisical at best, with loosening of restrictions long before adequate disease control had been achieved. And in much of the country, people simply don’t wear masks, largely because our leaders have stated outright that masks are political tools rather than effective infection control measures. The government has appropriately invested heavily in vaccine development, but its rhetoric has politicized the development process and led to growing public distrust.
The United States came into this crisis with enormous advantages. Along with tremendous manufacturing capacity, we have a biomedical research system that is the envy of the world. We have enormous expertise in public health, health policy, and basic biology and have consistently been able to turn that expertise into new therapies and preventive measures. And much of that national expertise resides in government institutions. Yet our leaders have largely chosen to ignore and even denigrate experts.
The response of our nation’s leaders has been consistently inadequate. The federal government has largely abandoned disease control to the states. Governors have varied in their responses, not so much by party as by competence. But whatever their competence, governors do not have the tools that Washington controls. Instead of using those tools, the federal government has undermined them. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which was the world’s leading disease response organization, has been eviscerated and has suffered dramatic testing and policy failures. The National Institutes of Health have played a key role in vaccine development but have been excluded from much crucial government decision making. And the Food and Drug Administration has been shamefully politicized,3 appearing to respond to pressure from the administration rather than scientific evidence. Our current leaders have undercut trust in science and in government,4 causing damage that will certainly outlast them. Instead of relying on expertise, the administration has turned to uninformed “opinion leaders” and charlatans who obscure the truth and facilitate the promulgation of outright lies.
Let’s be clear about the cost of not taking even simple measures. An outbreak that has disproportionately affected communities of color has exacerbated the tensions associated with inequality. Many of our children are missing school at critical times in their social and intellectual development. The hard work of health care professionals, who have put their lives on the line, has not been used wisely. Our current leadership takes pride in the economy, but while most of the world has opened up to some extent, the United States still suffers from disease rates that have prevented many businesses from reopening, with a resultant loss of hundreds of billions of dollars and millions of jobs. And more than 200,000 Americans have died. Some deaths from Covid-19 were unavoidable. But, although it is impossible to project the precise number of additional American lives lost because of weak and inappropriate government policies, it is at least in the tens of thousands in a pandemic that has already killed more Americans than any conflict since World War II.
Anyone else who recklessly squandered lives and money in this way would be suffering legal consequences. Our leaders have largely claimed immunity for their actions. But this election gives us the power to render judgment. Reasonable people will certainly disagree about the many political positions taken by candidates. But truth is neither liberal nor conservative. When it comes to the response to the largest public health crisis of our time, our current political leaders have demonstrated that they are dangerously incompetent. We should not abet them and enable the deaths of thousands more Americans by allowing them to keep their jobs.
And not just inevitable deaths but Democrat governors were stuffing disease into nursing homes between March and May to cause as many deaths as possible for the media to hang on Trump. (It was apparent from early cases in Washington that nursing homes were particularly vulnerable.) As that would also cut elder care costs, it was a win-win.
Isn’t this the same journal that said people who refuse the vaccine lose their jobs and be quarantined under threat of legal action ?
Did the NEJM hacks identify the five loser progressive state governors that increased the death rate by forcing nursing homes to accept infected people ... of course not, that would inflame their masters.
>> seized by Leftism
And so has the corporate fabric of the Country.
Name one CEO that condemned those wishing harm upon POTUS regarding the recent Covid-19 attack.
The death toll is 2.6% of the infected and falling.
I’ve read that 1% of the total population of the US has had the virus. That is a tiny number.
The issue is what is the true number of infected. Many are asymptomatic. Others avoided telling anyone they were sick. So there is no solid state to gauges where we are. All are fake to some degree or another.
It is estimated that the Population of the USA in 2020 is over 330 million people.
Do the math. 200,000/330.000,000 = .066666%
EARLY TIMELINE OF CARONAVIRUS ENTRY TO USA
December 31, 2019: China reports the discovery of the coronavirus to the World Health Organization. And on same day,
December 31: Chinese officials in Wuhan in China’s central Hubei province confirmed dozens of cases of pneumonia from an unknown cause
January 3, 2020: CDC Director Robert Redfield sent an email to the director of the Chinese CDC, George Gao, formally offering to send U.S. experts to China to investigate the coronavirus.
January 5: CDC Director Redfield sent another email to the Chinese CDC Director, George Gao, formally offering to send U.S. experts to China to investigate the coronavirus outbreak,
January 6: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a level I travel notice for Wuhan, China due to the spreading coronavirus.
January 7: The CDC established a coronavirus incident management system to better share and respond to information about the virus.
January 11: The CDC updated a Level 1 travel health notice for Wuhan, China.
January 11: China reported its first known death from an illness caused by the coronavirus. The patient was a 61-year-old man in Wuhan.
January 14: WHO said there may have been human-to-human transmission of the virus, Reuters reported.
January 15: Li Qun, head of the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) emergency center, claims the risk of human-to-human transmission is “low,” the Journal reported.
January 17: After 12 days, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission started giving daily updates on new cases of the coronavirus.
January 17: The CDC began implementing public health entry screening at the 3 U.S. airports that received the most travelers from Wuhan – San Francisco, New York JFK, and Los Angeles.
January 18: Despite the presence of the caronavirus, Wuhan holds a “potluck” banquet for 40,000 “families” to try and break a world record, the New York Times reported. There were no warnings or restrictions about the new virus.
January 20: Dr. Fauci announces the National Institutes of Health is already working on the development of a vaccine for the coronavirus.
January 21: The CDC activated its emergency operations center to provide support to the coronavirus response.
January 21: The United States announced its first confirmed coronavirus case — a man in his 30s in Washington state
January 23: China placed Wuhan, a city of 11 million people, under quarantine orders. All flights and trains departing from the city were canceled, and buses, subways and ferries within the city were suspended. Wuhan is finally locked down, however about 5 million people had already fled the city, many, undoubtedly carrying the virus.
January 23: The CDC sought a “special emergency authorization” from the FDA to allow states to use its newly developed coronavirus test.
January 25: Chinese New Year – millions of Chinese from all over the world return to their homeland to celebrate this important holiday in the Chinese tradition. They later returned to their residences, spreading the virus all over the world. There was no warning issued from the Chinese government.
January 27: President Trump tweeted that he made an offer to President Xi Jinping to send experts to China to investigate the coronavirus outbreak.
January 27: The CDC issued a level III travel health notice urging Americans to avoid all nonessential travel to China due to the coronavirus.
January 27: The White House Coronavirus Task Force started meeting to help monitor and contain the spread of the virus and provide updates to the President.
January 29: The White House announced the formation of the Coronavirus Task Force to help monitor and contain the spread of the virus and provide updates to the President.
January 30: WHO declared the outbreak a global public health emergency as more than 9,000 cases were reported worldwide, including in 18 countries beyond China.
January 31: The Trump Administration: 1. Declared the coronavirus a public health emergency.
2. Announced Chinese travel restrictions.
3. Suspended entry into the United States for foreign nationals who pose a risk of transmitting the coronavirus.
President Trump bans Travel from China, declares a national emergency, and orders 1st Quarantine in 50 Years. At this point in time there is one only reported death attributed to Caronavirus in the US.
February 2: The CDC expanded enhanced entry screening to eight major airports across the nation.
February 4: President Trump vowed in his State of the Union Address to “take all necessary steps” to protect Americans from the coronavirus.
February 5: The Trump Administration and health officials briefed lawmakers on the Federal Government’s coronavirus response efforts.
February 9: The White House Coronavirus Task Force briefed governors from across the nation at the National Governors’ Association Meeting in Washington.
Almost anything in print between now and election day is worthless.
The enemy is desperate.
What I think is more important, the vulnerable are being protected better.
Problem short term? The ComDem’s are using this as a weapon in the upcoming election. Creating Chaos, fear and desperation.
I pray every day that this will cause a reaction that will destroy the conniving vermin on November 3rd.
Correct.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.