Due to the Trump Administration's lackluster response to the novel coronavirus, historians and political scientists agree that America's position as a global leader has come to an end. With COVID-19 ravaging the country, American exceptionalism has been revealed to be exaggerated.
"I would like to think that the world's leading democracy gave an example of how well it dealt with the coronavirus pandemic, better than China," Oxford University historian, Timothy Garton Ash told National Public Radio (NPR). "But it doesn't look good. he American health system and the American political system are coping with this much worse than many European democracies are."
The country began reopening this week started by Texas and Georgia. To some, this decision is premature given the lack of tests. However, according to Reuters, groups advising the White House on their coronavirus response value a speedy reopening over sufficient testing. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump claimed this week that U.S. deaths will "probably" not surpass 70,000 despite previous estimations that the U.S. would see millions of deaths and the fact that there were at least 63,260 deaths as of last Friday.
The White House has announced it will be blocking Dr. Anthony Fauci from testifying before Congress about their handling of the coronavirus response because they say he's too busy right now. They have also begun claiming China developed the novel coronavirus in a lab. On the other hand, China has also seen conspiracy theories blaming the U.S. for the virus, instead. A video created by the Chinese press mocked the U.S.'s response to the novel coronavirus with Legos.
The Good News
While the country may look bleak right now, there is good news to be found. The Trump Administration announced they will be launching Operation Warp Speed in an effort to develop a coronavirus vaccine quickly. Dr. Anthony Fauci said on the "Today" show that hundreds of millions of doses of the vaccine could be available as soon as January. This effort involves fast-tracking the approval process for the vaccine.
"You start making it, assuming it's going to work. And if it does, then you could scale up and hopefully get to that timeline," Fauci said.
Not to dampen the good news, but experts have expressed skepticism about the likelihood a vaccine could be developed at all, much less by January.
In other efforts to fast-track COVID-19 treatments, the Food and Drug Administration has announced they will be making it much easier for doctors to prescribe remdesvir, a drug produced by Gilead Sciences which has been shown in "gold standard clinical trial" to reduce hospital stay times for coronavirus patients and possibly help prevent death.
The Administration has also announced they will stop holding daily COVID-19 press briefings. This decision coincides with the appointment of Kayleigh McEnany, the White House' new press secretary. McEnany is the President's fourth press secretary in four years. The third press secretary never held a single press briefing. McEnany held her first press briefing on Friday. Due to social distancing, many reporters attended the briefing virtually.
When asked if she would "pledge never to lie" during the briefings, McEnany responded, " I will never lie to you. You have my word on that."
Previously, President Trump has come under fire for the recommendations and claims he's made during these briefings, including suggesting disinfectant injected into the lungs to treat the virus. Trump has since said he was asking a sarcastic question despite the fact that the statement was reportedly made before the question portion of the briefing.
Luckily, experts on public health and medical quackery agree that the misinformed treatments suggested by the President aren't likely to last long in the public ethos.
"False ideas last as long as they're marketable," founder of the website Quackwatch.com and retired psychiatrist Dr. Stephen Barrett told National Public Radio. "The idea about ingesting bleach is so far beyond stupid that I don't think it's going to last. The things that are the most dangerous tend not to last very long,"
White House Claims China Created the Novel Coronavirus
The White House is now claiming that they have proof that the virus was created in a Chinese lab despite contradictory claims by the medical community and the intelligence community which both argue the virus originated naturally.
"The best experts so far seem to think it was man-made. I have no reason to disbelieve that at this point," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said. He didn't provide any evidence for this claim. When pressed on the fact that the intelligence community disagrees with that statement, Pompeo said, "I've seen what the intelligence community has said. I have no reason to believe that they've got it wrong."
According to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, there is a "wide scientific consensus" that COVID-19 was not man-made, a consensus with which they agree. There is some question as to whether the virus was contracted at a meat market or escaped from one of two government labs in Wuhan conducting civilian research on biological hazards.
The White House doesn't seem to have reached an agreed-upon origin story considering statements by the President have been directly contradicted by his own staff. For instance, Trump said he was confident the virus came from a lab on the same day that Pompeo said they didn't know whether it came from the lab or the meat market.
Trump Replaces Watchdog Who Reported on Hospital Supply Shortages
Amidst a global health crisis, President Trump is attempting to replace the Department of Health and Human Services watchdog who found that there were severe shortages of medical supplies at hospitals across the country.
"Hospitals reported that they were unable to keep up with COVID-19 testing demands because they lacked complete kits and/or the individual components and supplies needed to complete tests," the watchdog report reads. The report is based on a survey of 323 hospitals. "When patient stays were extended while awaiting test results, this strained bed availability, personal protective equipment (PPE) supplies, and staffing."
In response to the watchdog's report, Trump implied at a press briefing that the watchdog, Investigator General Christi Grimm, was politically motivated. He asked her name and when she had appointed, later tweeting that she had "spent 8 years with the Obama Administration". Grimm was appointed to her position in January but has been a government official since 1999 and is not a political appointee. Implying she was a part of the Obama Administration is misleading.
Brett Giroir, the head of the White House's efforts to increase testing, said the watchdog report "mixes up all kinds of things" but didn't offer any examples. Trump himself simply called the report "wrong". Despite the criticism by Trump and his officials, medical professionals such as Dr. Irwin Redlener of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University say they've found the report helpful.
The current potential replacement for Grimm is Jason Weida, an assistant U.S. attorney general. This replacement is the most recent in a series of turnovers carried out by Trump against officials who raised concerns that led to his impeachment or officials who were in a position of oversight reporting on the Administration's own actions. After his firing by Trump, Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson pushed back against those questioning his actions.
"It is hard not to think that the President's loss of confidence in me derives from my having faithfully discharged my legal obligations as an independent and impartial Inspector General," said Atkinson.
Echoing Atkinson's sentiment, Washington Sen. Patty Murray, the ranking Democrat on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, defended Grimm's report and expressed her intentions to hold any Trump inspector general nominees to the highest standard.
"We all know the President hasn't told people the truth about this virus or his Administration's response, and late last night, he moved to silence an independent government official who did," Murray said in a statement. "Anyone who demands less will be complicit in the President's clear pattern of retaliation against those who tell the truth."