right here's a question can America cope
with the corona virus pandemic the last
really major one was back in 1918 when
the Spanish flu killed 675 thousand
people in the United States since then
America has rarely been tested until now
and Donald Trump has just banned most
travelers from Europe to the United
States for 30 days having previously
tried to downplay what he calls a
foreign virus I'm officially declaring a
national emergency so why has the
world's largest economy attracted so
much criticism over its response to
kovat 19 right this is a big test for
President Trump in his reelection year
an opportunity for him to show strength
during a crisis yet two things happened
a few years ago that didn't help the
administration in advance of this
outbreak firstly let's talk about this
guy Tim Zima he used to be the head of
global health security on the National
Security Council
basically he and a group of experts
would coordinate responses to outbreaks
he was in charge of for example the
president's malaria initiative sounds
like he'd be a pretty good person to
deal with this covert 19 outbreak yeah
well in 2018
he left his position and his office was
eliminated experts back then worried
about his departure one member of the
Foreign Affairs Committee said expertise
like his is critical in avoiding large
outbreaks was it a mistake that the
folks who do you believe to dismantle
the office within the National Security
Council charged with global health and
security um I wouldn't necessarily
characterize it as a mistake I would say
we worked very well with that office it
would be nice if the office was still
there the second thing is that in 2018
the budget for the CDC
that's the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention was cut by 80% and its
operations scale back in many countries
again concerns were raised here's what a
group of Health Organization's wrote to
the Trump administration back then the
United States stands to lose vital
information about epidemic threats
garnered on the ground through trusted
relationships real-time surveillance and
research however the head of the CDC has
said recently that it's been
chronically underfunded for years by
different administrations under
presidents from both parties and that's
not just a United States problem it's a
global one you don't prepare for a
crisis like this in four weeks
and globally we have been under
investing in preparing and we know it
clearly and so that brings us to today
and the coronavirus what's the United
States political response been like now
each country is responding to the virus
in different ways and with differing
results and there's no clear-cut best
way to respond to this pandemic yet the
United States has sent mixed messages
from the end of January the White House
message was consistent Keep Calm we have
this under control the American people
should rest assured that they are safe
and we are monitoring this situation in
real time the resources are deployed the
government's mobilized and we feel
confident and we know the steps to take
right now to contain it the next day
after the w-h-o declared a public health
emergency the United States did the same
and it also quarantined US citizens
returning from whom a province now Trump
said come late February that that
response had helped the United States
stop the spread and even stated on
February the 26th that the 15 cases
recorded in the country at that time
would soon disappear when you have 15
people and the 15 within a couple of
days is going to be down to close to
zero that's a pretty good job we've done
that was not true two weeks after that
statement the number of confirmed cases
in the United States was over a thousand
and the nation's leading expert on
infectious diseases said things were
going to get worse we will see more
cases and things will get worse than
they are right now and Trump has come
out with some dubious claims now the
virus that we're talking about having to
do you know a lot of people think that
goes away in April with the heat as the
heat comes in typically that will go
away and April we're in great shape
though well I think the three point four
percent is really false number now this
is just my hunch so I think that that
number is very high I think the number
personally I would say the number is way
under 1% price
criticism and after the whu-oh
characterized the outbreak as a pandemic
mr. Trump gave an oval office address on
March 11th to announce a new dramatic
change to keep new cases from entering
our shores we will be suspending all
travel from Europe to the United States
for the next 30 days oh and it's worth
remembering about the day before Trump
said this it's over a hundred different
countries and it hit the world and we're
prepared and we're doing a great job
with it and it will go away to stay calm
moving on from the mixed messaging from
the White House part of the reason for
the uptick in cases was that there just
weren't enough tests for coronavirus
available and so not enough people were
being tested for example by February the
25th only 426 people have been tested in
the whole United States
compare that to more than 35,000 tested
in South Korea by the same time so why
was that let's talk about the CDC now
they're the main body overseeing this
all in the United States the sort of
American version of the w-h-o now as
China alerted the world to this new
virus and began locking down Wuhan
countries had time to prepare themselves
but it seems the United States might not
have done that
the CDC began sending out test kits to
labs in the first week of February so
over a month after the outbreak first
became globally known but then labs
reported that some of the kits were not
giving conclusive results they told
health departments to send their samples
back to the CDC HQ in Atlanta and they
will provide the results so the test was
sent out late they were wrong and then
due to the CDC having to take in the
samples results were slow coming out by
the way there are other tests out there
China can test up to 1.6 million people
with theirs and German labs published
their own version which the whu-oh uses
however the CDC insisted that labs could
only use their tests CDC's role in this
was we very rapidly within almost seven
to ten days developed a test from the
non known pathogen once we had the
sequence during that process of quality
control we found out one of the reagents
wasn't working appropriately and we had
to modify that with the FDA that took
several weeks to get that completed
but the test was always available in
Atlanta now none of this caused any
immediate issues for the CDC at a time
because demand wasn't that high from
around stapes but that was partly
because the CDC advice was that only
those who had returned from certain
affected countries could be tested so
for example if you've been abroad and in
close proximity with international
travelers in large crowds and might have
developed some of the symptoms you would
not have been able to be tested for the
novel coronavirus health experts were
calling on the CDC to change this advice
and they finally got their wish on March
the 4th when it was announced that
anyone who wants a coronavirus test may
get one if a doctor agrees but with that
came more demand and more pressure on a
system that was still not ready and
states have complained that they are
still waiting for tests you know we
still have a very limited number of
tests overall one letter from a New York
official said the slow federal action on
this matter has impeded our ability to
beat back this epidemic the system does
not is not really geared to what we need
right now what you are asking for that
is a failing and I mean yes it is a fail
let's admit it
so let's finally talk a bit more about
that knock-on effect all this has for
those on the ground take the first
United States case of coronavirus which
occurred in Washington State on January
the 20th there were no no new cases in
the state until late February but then
suddenly we saw a large number of cases
emerging from a care home there the Life
Care Center of Kirkland that care home
in Seattle has seen more than 12 people
died from corona virus and there are
reports that more than 60 staff are
showing symptoms of the virus and yet
when asked why they were still behind in
testing everyone the head of the
facility said they'd asked the local and
federal government for help every five
minutes of every day since this became
apparent here within the facility to
date we still have no results reported
back to us on post-mortem deaths nor can
I confirm that those are
that those patients are being actively
tested as people and politicians became
more frustrated by the government and
the CDC Donald Trump did sign an
emergency bill on March 6 that provided
eight point three billion dollars to
health officials and to support research
and vaccine development and Mike Pence
has said that health insurance companies
will waive co-pays for testing and cover
the cost of treatment for the novel
coronavirus you need to make a
commitment to the American people so
they come in to get tested you can
operationalize the payments for tomorrow
I think you're an excellent question
there so my answer is yes excellent
everybody in America here that you are
eligible to go get tested for
coronavirus and have that covered
regardless of insurance but the way the
numbers went up so drastically and the
struggle to contain it shows how bad the
knock-on effect can be if testing is
delayed and there was a problem getting
kicked out to people who need it what we
have then is a perfect storm of problems
in the United States a president was
modeled messages a CDC making errors and
all that feeding down to the state level
that's not to say every other country is
better off than the United States China
has suppressed information and its
authoritarian regime can implement
decisions aggressively and Italy and
Iran have struggled to deal with the
outbreak indeed would a mass lockdown of
cities or towns or states earlier on
have been helpful or would it have
caused mass panic there are lessons to
be learned from many countries after
this outbreak and indeed virus experts
have for years been warning governments
politicians us that we just aren't
prepared for something like this and too
often we just throw money at these
issues when they happen rather than
offering long-term solutions to deal
with the next outbreak
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