Handling the coronavirus crisis

[Admin]

First-person accounts of a tense meeting at the White House in late March suggest that President Trump’s son-in-law resisted taking federal action to alleviate shortages and help Democratic-led New York. Instead, he enlisted a former roommate to lead a Consultant State to take on the Deep State, with results ranging from the Eastman Kodak fiasco to a mysterious deal to send ventilators to Russia...

Those representing the private sector expected to learn about a sweeping government plan to procure supplies and direct them to the places they were needed most. New York, home to more than a third of the nation’s coronavirus cases, seemed like an obvious candidate. In turn they came armed with specific commitments of support, a memo on the merits of the Defense Production Act, a document outlining impediments to the private-sector response, and two key questions: How could they best help? And how could they best support the government’s strategy?

What actually transpired in the room stunned a number of those in attendance. Vanity Fair has reconstructed the details of the meeting for the first time, based on recollections, notes, and calendar entries from three people who attended the meeting. All quotations are based on the recollections of one or more individual attendees.

Kushner, seated at the head of the conference table, in a chair taller than all the others, was quick to strike a confrontational tone. “The federal government is not going to lead this response,” he announced. “It’s up to the states to figure out what they want to do.”

One attendee explained to Kushner that due to the finite supply of PPE, Americans were bidding against each other and driving prices up. To solve that, businesses eager to help were looking to the federal government for leadership and direction.

“Free markets will solve this,” Kushner said dismissively. “That is not the role of government.”

The same attendee explained that although he believed in open markets, he feared that the system was breaking. As evidence, he pointed to a CNN report about New York governor Andrew Cuomo and his desperate call for supplies.

“That’s the CNN bullshit,” Kushner snapped. “They lie.”

According to another attendee, Kushner then began to rail against the governor: “Cuomo didn’t pound the phones hard enough to get PPE for his state…. His people are going to suffer and that’s their problem.”

“That’s when I was like, We’re screwed,” the shocked attendee told Vanity Fair.

The group argued for invoking the Defense Production Act. “We were all saying, ‘Mr. Kushner, if you want to fix this problem for PPE and ventilators, there’s a path to do it, but you have to make a policy change,’” one person who attended the meeting recounted.

In response Kushner got “very aggressive,” the attendee recalled. “He kept invoking the markets” and told the group they “only understood how entrepreneurship works, but didn’t understand how government worked.”

Though Kushner’s arguments “made no sense,” said the attendee, there seemed to be little hope of changing his mind. “It felt like Kushner was the president. He sat in the chair and he was clearly making the decisions.”

Kushner was accompanied by Navy Rear Admiral John Polowczyk, who had just been posted to FEMA to lead supply-chain efforts. He heaped flattery on Kushner, calling his ideas “brilliant,” and expressed skepticism concerning the motives of those in the room and on the phone. “Are you trying to hawk your wares on us?” he asked one participant...

That attendee said he remains “angry” over the federal government’s intransigence in stockpiling supplies and feels certain that people died because of it. “At the time I just thought of it as blind capitalism and extreme libertarian ideals gone wrong,” he said. “In hindsight it’s not crazy to think it was some purposeful belief that it was okay if Cuomo had a tough go of it because [New York] was a blue state.”

According to another attendee, it seemed “very clear” Kushner was less interested in finding a solution because, at the time, the virus was primarily ravaging cities in blue states: “We were flabbergasted. I basically had an out-of-body experience: Where am I, and what happened to America?”

“That’s Their Problem”: How Jared Kushner Let the Markets Decide America’s COVID-19 Fate | Vanity Fair

[Admin]

Dr. Alexander’s point-by-point assessment, broken into seven parts and forwarded by Mr. Caputo to Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the C.D.C. director, was one of several emails obtained by The New York Times that illustrate how Mr. Caputo and Dr. Alexander attempted to browbeat career officials at the C.D.C. at the height of the pandemic, challenging the science behind their public statements and attempting to silence agency staff.

Emails Detail Effort to Silence C.D.C. and Question Its Science - The New York Times

[Admin]

Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates said the implementation of the government’s travel ban may have exacerbated the coronavirus outbreak in the U.S. earlier this year. In an interview with Fox News Sunday, part of which was released Friday, Gates said the ban led people abroad to rush back to the U.S. and that proper safety and testing measures were not in place upon their return, sparking further spread of the virus.  “We created this rush, and we didn’t have the ability to test or quarantine those people. And so that seeded the disease here. You know, the ban probably accelerated that, the way it was executed,” Gates, who has dedicated much of his philanthropy efforts toward global health initiatives, told Fox News Sunday anchor Chris Wallace.

Wallace then pressed him on the point, asking if he was saying the travel restrictions, which President Trump touted as limiting the spread of the coronavirus in the U.S., had made things worse. “March saw this incredible explosion — the West Coast coming from China and then the East Coast coming out of Europe," Gates replied in the excerpts provided by Fox News. "And so, even though we’d seen China and we’d seen Europe, that testing capacity and clear message of how to behave wasn’t there." Trump on Jan. 31 barred entry to the United States of foreign travelers who had been in China in the past two weeks. The order became effective on Feb. 22 and it did not apply to U.S. residents and their families. Trump on March 11 imposed a ban on travel from Europe. The ban did not initially include Ireland and the United Kingdom, but a week later those countries were included.  The president has frequently touted the ban, saying it was critical in saving lives early on in the pandemic.

“[W]e saved tens of thousands of lives, probably hundreds of thousands of lives. And we saved millions of lives by doing the closing and now the opening the way we did it,” Trump said at a press conference last week. The president has also noted that Democrats were opposed to the ban at the time, with some calling the restrictions on travelers from China “xenophobic” at the time. The effectiveness of the bans have been questioned in recent months, with reports emerging that tens of thousands of travelers from China were able to still come to the U.S. through loopholes in Trump’s measure.

Gates says travel ban made COVID-19 worse in US | TheHill

• The one thing the President keeps touting was counterproductive.
  
• The scenes at the airports, with people packed like sardines, were already ominous.
  
• Actually, that Chinese travel ban that the President keeps touting was very soft, some 40K people came back after it was instigated.
  

[Admin]

• Trump, by interfering with the FDA, the CDC, putting out unrealistic time-frames for the vaccine is damaging the country in yet another way, trust in the vaccine has plummeted from 70%+ a couple of months ago to 51% in September, that is, just 51% of Americans say they'll take the vaccine, which is prolonging the pandemic, infections and deaths.
  

[Admin]

As the official U.S. death toll from COVID-19 approaches 200,000, with more than 6.6 million reported cases, The Washington Post has revealed the White House scuttled a plan to distribute 650 million cloth face masks to every residence in the United States during the early weeks of the coronavirus pandemic. Vice President Pence and other officials rejected the proposal because, quote, “receiving masks might create concern or panic.” A draft press release about the plan from the U.S. Postal Service reads, “The first shipments are expected to reach U.S. households as early as April xx” — with the date left incomplete.

One study by the Center for Economic Policy Research found widespread mask use across the United States would have saved 40,000 lives in the months of April and May alone.
This comes as the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Wednesday U.S. residents should not expect to receive a vaccine for the coronavirus until at least mid-2021, contradicting President Trump’s claim at least 100 million doses could be distributed by the end of 2020. Dr. Robert Redfield was speaking at a Senate hearing on the federal government’s response to the pandemic.

DR. ROBERT REDFIELD: The face masks, these face masks, are the most important, powerful public health tool we have. And I will continue to appeal for all Americans, all individuals in our country, to embrace these face coverings. I’ve said that if we did it for six, eight, 10, 12 weeks, we’d bring this pandemic under control. These, actually, we have clear scientific evidence they work, and they are our best defense. I might even go so far as to say that this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine, because the immunogenicity may be 70%, and if I don’t get an immune response, the vaccine is not going to protect me. This face mask will.

AMY GOODMAN: President Trump lashed out at Dr. Redfield’s testimony, telling reporters in the White House press briefing room the top U.S. public health official misspoke.

Infectious disease expert: Trump’s attacks on CDC, doctors and scientists undermine a ‘pillar of pandemic control’ – Alternet.org

• There is much more in the story..
  

[Admin]

On September 20, the CDC also updated its guidance to say that the “main way” the virus spreads is through droplets or small particles, “like aerosols.” Air quality scientists and engineers who have been calling for such a change celebrated. With recognition of this mode of transmission, the scientists hope, communities can think more about the ventilation of indoor spaces and perhaps engineer solutions to make these spaces safer.

The CDC also noted the “growing evidence” these droplets and airborne particles can travel more than 6 feet in the air. (Though, it’s been clear for quite some time that the 6 feet guidance was insufficient to explain all the facets of the risk in catching Covid-19.) But then, on Monday, the CDC retracted its updated guidance, writing “a draft version of proposed changes to these recommendations was posted in error to the agency’s official website.” It was not immediately clear why the update was retracted. But something stinks: As the New York Times and other media outlets have reported, President Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services has been interfering with the CDC’s scientific communications for apparent political reasons.

Is the coronavirus airborne? The latest CDC guidance, explained. - Vox

• And yet another CDC guideline mysteriously retracted..
  

[Admin]

Donald Trump told supporters at his latest rally in Ohio that the coronavirus “affects virtually nobody” despite the US death toll from the pandemic due to pass 200,000.

Trump news live: Latest US election updates as president defends handling of coronavirus crisis | The Independent

• Amazing on so many levels, where to start. For starters, tell that to the families of 200K+ deaths.
  
• Then it's affecting several orders of magnitude more people than any antifa violence could ever do
  
• Also, it completely contradicts what he said to Bernstein, in taped interviews.
  
• But they didn't implement a national strategy because mostly minorities in blue states were the victims, so they could blame them.
  
• Secondly, tell that to the families of 200K+ deaths.
  
• Then there are numerous long-haulers who are suffering grave consequences for months and might very well have compromised health for the rest of their lives.
  
• Or the people with other organ damage as a result of Covid, like heart damage.
  
• Yes, it does affect older people and people with pre-existing conditions much more, but do they deserve to die as a result? Do these people don't matter? What has happened to the "pro-life" party?
  
• 133M people have with pre-existing conditions, that's almost half the US population under 65. 
  
• And people with pre-existing conditions will suffer doubly as they won't be able to insure themselves at reasonable cost if the Trump government sponsored case against Obamacare wins on November 10, a couple of days after the election.
  
• Having had Covid will also become a pre-existing condition so anyone who has had it might not be able to afford medical insurance if the Trump government sponsored case against Obamacare wins. Contrary to what the President claims, that's a lot of people.
  
• In fact, the pandemic will affect people attending these rallies, where they pack mostly older people indoors like sardines, screaming and chanting and few wearing masks (booing even a Republican governor arguing for masks). The "pro-life" party has become a death cult.
  

[Admin]

From The Atlantic:

Autopsies have found traces of the coronavirus’s genetic material in the heart, and actual viral particles within the heart’s muscle cells. Experiments have found that SARS-CoV-2 can destroy lab-grown versions of those cells. Several studies have now shown that roughly 10 to 30 percent of hospitalized COVID-19 patients had high levels of troponin—a protein released into the blood when the heart’s muscle cells are damaged. Such patients are more likely to die than others with no signs of heart injury.

This is worrying for people with severe symptoms, but more recently, a few studies suggested that COVID-19 can cause heart inflammation, or myocarditis, even in people who showed mild symptoms, or had recovered. These results were controversial but concerning. Myocarditis is frequently caused by viruses, and resolves on its own in many cases. But it can progress to more severe heart problems, and is one of the leading causes of sudden death in young adults. These studies contributed to decisions by two college football conferences—the Big Ten and the Pac-12—to cancel their fall season. (The Big Ten has since reversed its call, and the Pac-12 is considering doing the same)

[Admin]

The Trump administration’s bungled response to the coronavirus pandemic and its subsequent efforts to meddle with recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are taking a substantial toll on the nation’s foremost public health institution. In interviews with half a dozen current and former CDC officials, they described a workforce that has seen its expertise questioned, its findings overturned for political purposes and its effectiveness in combating the pandemic undermined by partisan actors in Washington. “I have never seen morale this low. It’s just, people are beaten down. People are beaten down partially by a public who not only distrusts us but who actually think we want to infringe on their civil liberties,” said one current CDC employee. “The other factor is the active undermining by senior members of our own administration.”

Despair at CDC after Trump influence: 'I have never seen morale this low' | TheHill

[Admin]

• The pandemic is bad for Trump's election prospects, so he does everything to minimize its importance, it's already behind us, it will disappear, a vaccine is just around the corner, touting fake cures, hammering states and business to open, forcing kids back to school, touting the stock market recovery, ridiculing masks, holding political rallies packing elderly mask-less screaming people together like sardines, contradicting and pressuring reputable specialist and institutions, etc. etc.
  
• And all this is counterproductive, it only worsens the pandemic. 
  
• And since the Bernstein book, we know that he's fully aware of this..