Friday, March 13, 2020

This Is Getting Terrifying - As Trump Debuts A New Campaign Slogan: "I Don't Take Responsibility At All"

This is absolutely terrifying.

Chris Hayes On How The U.S. Is On Italy's Coronavirus Trajectory (MSNBC, March 11, 2020)


Hayes: "The exponential curve shows the growth of coronavirus cases outside of China. Right now, there are nearly 45,000 confirmed cases in the world outside of China, where the outbreak appears to be under control."
"This is what the US curve looks like. Almost identical, right? Looks a lot like the global curve we just saw. In the US - four weeks ago - we had 15 cases. Just over a week ago, we had 100 cases. Today, we have over 1,200 cases. That number probably does not even capture the reality, because our testing capacity is not actually measuring the scope of the problem."

"What is clear is that we are racing up this exponential curve at an almost similar rate to the countries that have gone before us. For instance, Italy. Italy right now is in the midst of a full-blown public health crisis. The country [of 60 million people] is completely on lock-down. Today, a new measure announced. Italy announced it will stop almost all commercial activity aside from supermarkets and pharmacies. Think about that for a second. Everything closed, except for drug stores and food. Italy also announced today they now have over 12,000 cases and the total deaths in the country have increased - now listen to this - have increased over 30% in just 24 hours. From 631 to 827 - a 30% increase in fatalities in one day."
"This chart shows the rapid growth of cases in Italy. Does that look familiar? It should. You can also see how the US is right now following almost the exact same trajectory - just one week behind."
"Most of those deaths in Italy are likely a direct result of what we have already seen with this virus in Wuhan, China. The virus is overrunning the health care system capacity. Anywhere in the world, at any given time, in any given city, there is a fixed amount of doctors, ICUs, beds, ventilators. The systemic risk the virus poses to everyone around the world right now, including in the US, is what is happening now in Italy.

Doctors in that country ... are having to make war-time triage decisions about who they can afford to treat. ... Italian doctors are being forced to decide who to save and who to let die. [On Friday, a nurse in northern Italy said that fighting the virus was like being in the middle of "a world war".]

Tom Bossett, Trump's former Homeland Security adviser, told NBC News yesterday that we are 10 days away from the hospitals getting creamed. ... That is where we are headed right now, in this country. ... [Friday is now 8 days away.]

You can go read the warnings from Italians who say we did not take this seriously enough and now we are in it. That's their message to us. That message, however, is not being adequately communicated at all by the most powerful person in the country, a man who insists on propagating disinformation."
Chris Hayes: The Failure Of Coronavirus Comes From The Top | All In (MSNBC, March 12, 2020)


"All of this [the stock market having its worst drop in 33 years after Trump's error- and lie-filled speech on Wednesday night] is a reflection of the utter mismanagement and failure by this president from the very beginning of this pandemic. The coronavirus is presenting a governing test for every nation that is facing it. And right now, the federal US government is failing that test. And it is failing it from the top.

That is not my view. The director of the Harvard Global Health Institute said this: "This is an unmitigated disaster that the administration has brought upon the population, and I don't say this lightly ... We have had a much worse response than Iran, than Italy, than China and South Korea."

The National Security Council used to have a Global Health Team specifically to deal with pandemics like this. President Trump shut it down years ago [in May 2018]. The president then ordered some travel restrictions from China during the outbreak there that did not prevent the virus from reaching the US, obviously. And then, of course, there's the testing situation here, which Trump continues to lie about. And it's probably worse than any other country, outside of perhaps Iran, where we don't know what's really going on.

This was the president today: "Frankly, the testing has been going very smoothly. If you go to the right agency, if you go to the right area, you get the test."

That is flatly a lie. It's a lie. It is still extremely difficult for most people, the overwhelming majority, to get a coronavirus test. Three months after the first cases were reported in Wuhan, China. As the top infectious disease expert in the government, Dr. Anthony Fauci [Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases] acknowledged today, the testing system is failing.

"The system is not really geared to what we need right now. What you are asking for. That is a failing. ... It is a failing. Let's admit it."

Now that's what happening right now, just with the pandemic. But on top of that - keep this in mind - right now, the Trump administration is in court to try and destroy the entirety of the Affordable Care Act. They are right now pushing a budget, including - as of this week, in testimony - that would dramatically cut the budget of the Centers for Disease Control. And that's not to mention the president has used his his bully pulpit to repeatedly spread disinformation that quite literally elevates the risk for all of us. He said the cases are "going to be down to zero". He said "One day, it's like a miracle, it will disappear." He claimed the case "numbers look to be going down", not up. He keeps comparing it to the flu - to try to minimize it - despite the fact that every serious public health expert says it is not like the flu.

This has been the fear since Day One of this presidency, when we elected and then swore in, a racist game-show host to the most important job in the country. A job that tasks him with managing huge systemic risks on our behalf. The fear is that we would get to this point. And the Republican party made a deal. They accepted that risk, so they could get tax cuts for the rich and conservative judges. And right now, the bill is coming due."
Trump Admin Fails On Basic Guidance To Americans Facing Coronavirus | Rachel Maddow (MSNBC, March 12, 2020)


"We all now have figured out that one of the fiascoes - if not the fundamental fiascoe of the US government's response to this crisis - is that there isn't any testing, that we are probably the worst in the world, certainly the worst in the industrial world - at testing and screening for this virus. We've got it, probably, in every state in the country, we've got states of emergency in 30 states and we're still not broadly testing populations anywhere. ...

Whether you are in one of the nursing homes where there have been multiple deaths in Washington State or you just got off a cruise ship that had positive coronavirus on board, a cruise ship that was held offshore in California, or whether you went to a conference in New Orleans or Washington DC, where people were known to be positive, or Boston or somebody at your synagogue or your church or wedding you went to, has fallen ill or tested positive, if you have been somewhere where you believe there is a good chance that you have been exposed to this highly-contagious virus, chances are, still, this deep into it - this long into this crisis - that if you, as an American, are seeking testing to see if you yourself have in fact been exposed, you are going to have a hard time getting it. ...

Right now, we're watching the numbers go up everywhere, we know what the infection curves look like in other countries that have community transmission, and we still don't have testing. More than 1,000 confirmed cases in this country, an epidemic of absolutely unknown proportions, because we don't have testing ...

Donald Trump was asked on Friday about the almost non-existent pace of testing in the US (the CDC tested only 77 people this past week).
I don't take responsibility at all.

Trump disbanded the country's Global Health Team to save a few dollars, he rejected ready-to-go testing kits (endorsed by the World Health Organization) weeks ago, he has personally told the country numerous times that the crisis is no big deal, that the number of cases in the US could be counted on two hands, that the big fuss being made by the media is nothing but a partisan political hoax.

He refuses to even consider if he bears any responsibility. ... It's always someone else's fault.

Trump was then asked to explain why he disbanded (and never replaced) the Global Health Team:
When you say me, I didn't do it. ... I don't know anything about it.

You may find this hard to believe, but Trump was lying there, too.

This senator knows something about it (and he knows Trump knows something about it).





Remember When?
Separated At Birth?

The CDC has tested only about 1,600 patients - since January.

Trump rejected the offer of the test kits used by the World Health Organization - he said, no thanks - because it was most important to him that the government contract for all of the kits go to an American company.

In February, the only coronavirus test authorized by the FDA was one developed by the CDC. But they were limited in number and were also faulty, giving inconclusive or negative results to samples that should have tested positive.

One day (presumably), tests that actually work properly will be available in the US. At that point, it could take weeks before thousands of medical personnel are trained to run the tests.

Americans have died - and more will die in the coming weeks - because Trump turned down internationally-approved test kits weeks ago, so one of his big donors could nab a fat government contract. Imagine if your mother or your spouse or one of your children was one of the dead.
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1 comment:

johngoldfine said...

Worth noting is Trump's attempt (denied, but of course it would be denied!) to get a vaccine for USA alone.

https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-germany-covid-19-vaccine-not-for-sale-donald-trump-2020-3

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 6:17:00 AM

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