At this point it's clear: The Trump Administration has failed. The United States has so far incurred 26,000 deaths, 79 per million; South Korea, in contrast, has incurred 225 deaths, just 4 per million. Taiwan's death toll stands at just 6 deaths (0.3 per million) and Singapore's death toll stands at 10 (2 per million). ( https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/15/opinions/trump-admin-coronavirus-investigation-opinion-sachs/index.html )
On
the basis of the reports from China, on December 31 Taiwan immediately
began to screen flight arrivals from Wuhan, where the coronavirus
emerged,
without waiting for WHO guidance or any other advice. South Korea began
to screen flights from January 3rd. The
US screening that began on January 17 was haphazard at best,
nonexistent in many places at worst. Why didn't the US government follow
the lead of Taiwan, South Korea and others on flight screenings? It
becomes disturbingly clear that
President Donald Trump was unable to process the information he had
access to early in the pandemic in order to develop an effective plan of
action in order to protect the American general public. December 31st
is the date given as to when it was being reported by official channels
that potential for the Covid19 virus spreading unchecked into other
nations was very high.
From December 31st until January 17th nothing was being done to monitor entry points into the United States to at least record who was coming into the country that may be at risk of having had come in contact with Covid19.
On January 23, the WHO Emergency Committee declined to declare Covid19 a global health emergency, an action that it took a week later, on January 30. The Centers for Disease Control sent out faulty test kits around the United States in early February. Red tape prevented the issue from being resolved as quickly as possible. Other nations developed test kits and went into large-scale testing weeks before the United States. Early on in the outbreak, Trump repeatedly asserted that the pandemic was not a great threat in the United States. On January 22nd Trump told the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland " We have it totally under control" and with those words tried to build a false sense of confidence in people in the United States and in the world. In February, Trump asserted that with the warm weather of April, the virus "miraculously goes away," again misaligning the truth and the reality of the situation. There happen to be a number of such inaccuracies spouted out by President Trump. The federal government and many states have been in a nonstop battle over scarce and urgently needed supplies including personal protective equipment (PPE), ventilators, test kits and other medical basics. Trump long-delayed invoking the authority of the Defense Production Act, causing governors and mayors to scramble desperately until now for these missing supplies. What was the purpose of the delay at such a critical time?
There is no national strategy to reopen the economy with many Governors in open conflict about the best plan of action to reboot the economic life of the world's leading economy. The president has stated that the Coronavirus has passed its peak with the 632,000 confirmed cases in the United States, “The battle continues, but the data suggests that nationwide we have passed the peak on new cases” Trump stated Wednesday.
Donald Trump has suspended funding of the World Health Organization. The U.S. is the biggest donor to the WHO giving 400m a year to the organization. “It’s a bizarre decision that would be profoundly detrimental to global public health,” said Gavin Yamey, the director of Duke University’s center for policy impact in global health. “He’s trying to distract from his own errors that have led to the worst government response to Covid19 on Earth.” It looks like Trump wants to play the blame game instead of cooperating and making decisions based on professional research and data from the WHO. Trump and his supporters have focused on a 14 January WHO tweet reporting the findings of preliminary Chinese studies suggesting “no clear evidence” of human-to-human transmission. On 23 January the WHO updated its account of the coronavirus threat, confirming human-to-human transmission and warning that the global risk was high. One week later it formally declared a global emergency. It is unfair for the president to point to one tweet to asses the reliability of the information coming from the WHO. The whole point of science is that we have initial hypotheses and initial ideas, and we update those ideas as more and more data emerges.
Announcing the cut in funding on Tuesday, Trump accused the WHO of failing to send its experts to the source of the outbreak to gather samples. That failure decisively set back the effect to contain the pandemic, he claimed. In fact, Beijing blocked a WHO delegation from visiting Wuhan in the first weeks of the outbreak. In many ways, it is China that is responsible for the delayed response and slow reactions of countries like the United States. Trump attempted to praise the hard work of the Chinese in containing the outbreak on Jan 24th only 5 days before the director-general of the WHO was compelled to fly to Beijing to meet with Xi Jinping to negotiate entry and information sharing between China and the WHO.
While virtually no testing was underway in the US throughout February, Trump assumed the consequently low number of confirmed US cases meant that his country had somehow escaped. “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA,” he boasted on 24 February, nearly a month after the WHO declaration of emergency. Trump’s turn against the WHO only gathered pace over the past week, as more and more reports emerged of the administration’s own lethargic and dysfunctional response. Former President Jimmy Carter had this to say "I am distressed by the decision to withhold critically needed U.S. funding for the World Health Organization, especially during an international pandemic," Mr. Carter said, according to a statement from The Carter Center. "WHO is the only organization capable of leading the effort to control this virus."
Tidal waves of negative propaganda, social media misinformation and fake news tweets will offer no help to this nation as we are within a whirlwind of social change and uncertainty. The next year will define a generation and write the history of how the modern world deals with a pandemic with all of our technological mastery and devices of instant gratification. It is very frustrating to see the president of the United States unable to work cohesively with entities that have the resources and personnel to navigate a pandemic. This administration has been an interesting example of poorly qualified people holding positions they have no idea of how to administer justice or deliver an honest statement about the state of anything.
From December 31st until January 17th nothing was being done to monitor entry points into the United States to at least record who was coming into the country that may be at risk of having had come in contact with Covid19.
On January 23, the WHO Emergency Committee declined to declare Covid19 a global health emergency, an action that it took a week later, on January 30. The Centers for Disease Control sent out faulty test kits around the United States in early February. Red tape prevented the issue from being resolved as quickly as possible. Other nations developed test kits and went into large-scale testing weeks before the United States. Early on in the outbreak, Trump repeatedly asserted that the pandemic was not a great threat in the United States. On January 22nd Trump told the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland " We have it totally under control" and with those words tried to build a false sense of confidence in people in the United States and in the world. In February, Trump asserted that with the warm weather of April, the virus "miraculously goes away," again misaligning the truth and the reality of the situation. There happen to be a number of such inaccuracies spouted out by President Trump. The federal government and many states have been in a nonstop battle over scarce and urgently needed supplies including personal protective equipment (PPE), ventilators, test kits and other medical basics. Trump long-delayed invoking the authority of the Defense Production Act, causing governors and mayors to scramble desperately until now for these missing supplies. What was the purpose of the delay at such a critical time?
There is no national strategy to reopen the economy with many Governors in open conflict about the best plan of action to reboot the economic life of the world's leading economy. The president has stated that the Coronavirus has passed its peak with the 632,000 confirmed cases in the United States, “The battle continues, but the data suggests that nationwide we have passed the peak on new cases” Trump stated Wednesday.
Donald Trump has suspended funding of the World Health Organization. The U.S. is the biggest donor to the WHO giving 400m a year to the organization. “It’s a bizarre decision that would be profoundly detrimental to global public health,” said Gavin Yamey, the director of Duke University’s center for policy impact in global health. “He’s trying to distract from his own errors that have led to the worst government response to Covid19 on Earth.” It looks like Trump wants to play the blame game instead of cooperating and making decisions based on professional research and data from the WHO. Trump and his supporters have focused on a 14 January WHO tweet reporting the findings of preliminary Chinese studies suggesting “no clear evidence” of human-to-human transmission. On 23 January the WHO updated its account of the coronavirus threat, confirming human-to-human transmission and warning that the global risk was high. One week later it formally declared a global emergency. It is unfair for the president to point to one tweet to asses the reliability of the information coming from the WHO. The whole point of science is that we have initial hypotheses and initial ideas, and we update those ideas as more and more data emerges.
Announcing the cut in funding on Tuesday, Trump accused the WHO of failing to send its experts to the source of the outbreak to gather samples. That failure decisively set back the effect to contain the pandemic, he claimed. In fact, Beijing blocked a WHO delegation from visiting Wuhan in the first weeks of the outbreak. In many ways, it is China that is responsible for the delayed response and slow reactions of countries like the United States. Trump attempted to praise the hard work of the Chinese in containing the outbreak on Jan 24th only 5 days before the director-general of the WHO was compelled to fly to Beijing to meet with Xi Jinping to negotiate entry and information sharing between China and the WHO.
While virtually no testing was underway in the US throughout February, Trump assumed the consequently low number of confirmed US cases meant that his country had somehow escaped. “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA,” he boasted on 24 February, nearly a month after the WHO declaration of emergency. Trump’s turn against the WHO only gathered pace over the past week, as more and more reports emerged of the administration’s own lethargic and dysfunctional response. Former President Jimmy Carter had this to say "I am distressed by the decision to withhold critically needed U.S. funding for the World Health Organization, especially during an international pandemic," Mr. Carter said, according to a statement from The Carter Center. "WHO is the only organization capable of leading the effort to control this virus."
Tidal waves of negative propaganda, social media misinformation and fake news tweets will offer no help to this nation as we are within a whirlwind of social change and uncertainty. The next year will define a generation and write the history of how the modern world deals with a pandemic with all of our technological mastery and devices of instant gratification. It is very frustrating to see the president of the United States unable to work cohesively with entities that have the resources and personnel to navigate a pandemic. This administration has been an interesting example of poorly qualified people holding positions they have no idea of how to administer justice or deliver an honest statement about the state of anything.
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