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Trump reassures Americans coronavirus risk is low, puts Pence in charge of U.S. response


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Trump reassures Americans coronavirus risk is low, puts Pence in charge of U.S. response

By Jeff Mason and Jonathan Allen

 

2020-02-26T140526Z_1_LYNXNPEG1P1GO_RTROPTP_4_CHINA-HEALTH-USA.JPG

FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump wave as they board Air Force One as they conclude their two day visit to India, at Air Force Station Palam in New Delhi, India, February 25, 2020. Picture taken February 25, 2020. REUTERS/Al Drago

 

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Donald Trump assured Americans on Wednesday the risk from coronavirus remained "very low," and placed Vice President Mike Pence in charge of the U.S. response to the looming global health crisis.

 

At a White House briefing with his coronavirus task force, Trump said public health officials were preparing to do "whatever we have to" to deal with the outbreak.

 

He said he would accept whatever amount of emergency spending Congress decided to allocate, and was not immediately considering travel restrictions to and from countries such as South Korea and Italy that are dealing with outbreaks.

 

"The risk to the American people remains very low," Trump said, flanked by Pence and public health officials.

 

"We're ready to adapt and we're ready to do whatever we have to as the disease spreads, if it spreads," he said, adding the spread of the virus in the United States was not "inevitable."

 

"It probably will, it possibly will. It could be at a very small level, or it could be at a larger level. Whatever happens we’re totally prepared," he said.

 

Public health officials on Wednesday warned Americans to prepare for more coronavirus cases and New York City announced plans to provide up to 1,200 hospital beds if needed as U.S. stock markets fell for the fifth consecutive day.

 

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infections Diseases, said that while the virus was contained in the United States, Americans must prepare for a potential outbreak as transmissions spread outside of China.

 

"If we have a pandemic, then almost certainly we are going to get impacted," Fauci told CNN.

 

Officials at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday said the virus' global march had raised concern about its spread in the United States, though it remained unclear when that might happen or how severe it would be.

 

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said the United States has 59 coronavirus cases, including 42 American passengers repatriated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan.

 

"We have to be alert to the possibility of a pandemic," Peter Marks, director of the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said in an interview.

 

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio called on the federal government to help it obtain 300,000 extra protective masks. There were no confirmed cases of coronavirus in the city, he said.

 

Global stock markets have slumped in recent days due to worries over a prolonged disruption to supply chains and economies from the virus, which has infected about 80,000 people and killed nearly 3,000, mostly in China.

 

U.S. stocks turned lower in afternoon trading on Wednesday in a fresh wave of selling sparked by fears of the coronavirus spreading in the United States. The S&P 500 index fell for a fifth straight day and the Dow Jones Industrial Average ended down 123.77 points, or 0.46%. [.N]

 

(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Jonathan Allen; additional reporting by Steve Holland, Makini Brice, Susan Heavey and Michael Erman; Writing by John Whitesides and Alistair Bell; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Bill Berkrot and Grant McCool)

 

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-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-02-27
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The US gov't has a very delicate balancing act.

 

I don't see them quarantining large cities at the expense of the economy like China has done.

 

If they continue to allow workers to work, this super contagious virus will spread and hospitals will flood and casualties will grow.

 

A vaccine won't be ready until late next year, and previous SARS vaccines weren't effective and/or killed the test subjects, so don't count on that.

 

Maybe it will just be another endemic virus we have to deal with, that hopefully grows milder over time.

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25 minutes ago, cmarshall said:

When Pence was governor of Indiana he totally mismanaged an AIDS outbreak in Scott County, both because Indiana had closed all of its AIDS testing centers a couple of years before and because Pence refused to approve a needle exchange program until after the peak of the outbreak when it was too late, naturally for religious reasons.  

 

Meanwhile Trump has now lied by claiming that the US has only 15 corona cases, when, in fact, it has 60, and he has fantasized that the number will soon be close to zero.  At the same press conference the reps from the CDC presented the real picture that the infection is certain to grow in the US and that organizations should be making their pandemic plans now.

 

It's hard to grasp the breathtaking incompetence of Trump and Pence.  And now a lot of Americans will pay the price.

What you have seen in China and seen Trump praising (and the WHO as well for good measure) is what will come to pass everywhere and soon. The logic and virulence of the virus dictates that not that of business. 

Edited by URMySunshine
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5 minutes ago, zydeco said:

The one thing to be feared above all else during a Trump administration: an international crisis calling for cool deliberation, informed decision making, and preparedness. 

+2020

 

If he had any sense he would postpone his rallies until further notice as they serve no purpose other than his own self-glorification. 

Edited by URMySunshine
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9 minutes ago, URMySunshine said:

+2020

 

If he had any sense he would postpone his rallies until further notice as they serve no purpose other than his own self-glorification. 

 

But if he doesn't hold his rallies who will stroke his ego now that Melania no longer does that?

 

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