The Economist : Covid-19 is spreading rapidly in America. The country does not look ready

[Celerity]

Uncle Sam v the coronavirus

There are structural reasons why America finds a response to the pandemic hard

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/03/12/covid-19-is-spreading-rapidly-in-america-the-country-does-not-look-ready



WASHINGTON, DC

When a new disease first took hold in Wuhan, the Chinese authorities did not have the luxury of advanced notice. Their initial strategy, in the crucial early weeks of what would become the global pandemic covid-19, was obfuscation and censorship, which did nothing to halt the spread of the virus that causes the disease. Only now, months after the first cases were reported, have new transmissions slowed to close to zero—and only after an unprecedented, draconian lockdown for hundreds of millions of citizens.

America, by contrast, had the luxury of several weeks’ notice. Yet the crucial early weeks when it could have prepared for the spread of the disease were squandered, in a country with some of the world’s best epidemiologists and physicians. As of March 11th, almost 1,300 Americans had been diagnosed with covid-19. Several times more probably have the disease undetected and are transmitting it within communities. And still the country looks behind in its preparations for what now threatens to be a bruising pandemic. (For more coverage of covid-19 see our coronavirus hub.) America’s decentralised authority, expensive health care and skimpy safety-net will all make the pandemic response harder to deal with. The uncertainty is high, but a plausible scenario—one-fifth of the population falling ill, and a 0.5% fatality rate—would lead to 327,000 deaths, or nine times that of a typical flu season.

How America got here was the result of two significant failures—one technical, the other of messaging. A country of America’s size could probably not have avoided a serious outbreak of covid-19. But with enough information, the early spread of the disease could have been slowed. That lowers the peak of the outbreak, lightening the load on hospitals when they are most overstretched, thereby saving lives. It also gives the health service and the government time to prepare, and the population a chance to learn how to respond.

However, in America the testing regime has worked badly, because of faulty test-kits manufactured by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (cdc) and tangles in administrative red tape between the cdc and the Food and Drug Administration (fda), another government agency. “The debacle with the tests probably reflects underlying budget cuts. You can’t have surge capacity if you’ve already been cut to the bone,” says Scott Burris, director of the Centre of Public Health Law Research at Temple University. In 2010 the cdc budget was $12.7bn in current dollars; today it is $8bn. Whether skimpy budgeting, bureaucratic blockages or both were to blame is as yet unclear and sure to be the subject of a future investigation.

snip

[durablend]

1. Notice not a mention of the idiot at the top

edit: not the person in the photo. You know who I'm talking about.

[Celerity]

5. go to the link (4 paragraph rule)

A successful testing regime also buys time for the right messaging. But from the start, President Donald Trump has downplayed the chance of big disruption to ordinary lives and the economy. His insistence that virus hysteria was being amped up by his political enemies has distracted from the crucial message, which is to get ready. His announcement on March 11th of a ban on most travel from Europe was confused (he initially appeared to suggest it would apply to cargo), arbitrary (it excludes Britain) and accomplishes little now that the virus is spreading from within.

Mr Trump has minimised the threat all the same. On March 9th he blamed the “Fake News Media” and Democrats for conspiring “to inflame the Coronavirus situation” and wrongly suggested that the common flu was more dangerous. The same day, Nancy Messonnier, an official at the cdc, was warning, correctly, that “as the trajectory of the outbreak continues, many people in the United States will at some point in time this year or next be exposed to this virus.”

Thus far in his presidency, Mr Trump has faced a few crises. Most he generated himself, including various trade wars and bouts of chest-thumping, which could generally be defused. The virus, however, will circulate no matter how much the president may wish it gone. Talking down the risks is not a winning strategy. To fight the outbreak, America needs clear, unvarnished public information and policies based on the best science. Is the president capable of endorsing that?

[Wednesdays]

10. "Many people...will be exposed to the coronavirus..."

"Many people" will likely be in the order of 40 to 70 percent.

[beachbumbob]

2. only 11,000 people have been tested to date in America, GOP and trump will end up murdering

thousands

[Hermit-The-Prog]

6. GOP, trump, Fox have exacerbated this crisis

[defacto7]

3. These financial sites just pick their stats out of thin air.

[Celerity]

7. The Economist is not some 'financial site', they are a close to 180 year old major global economic

newspaper of record. What stats are you taking issue with btw? The Economist is almost always very conservative in their calculation of most subjects, and they all do not pull shite 'out of thin air'.

[defacto7]

8. They published a misleading stat about the pandemic.

Such irresponsibility even if hidden in a what if is a bias we don't need in public interaction. There is too much false info being pumped onto the net. Dropping a .5% fatality rate is bad journalism if not manipulation. I don't care how long they've been publishing; that's a strawman argument. Who is writing this article is the only reputation that's questionable. .5% is shite out of thin air.

[Celerity]

9. What do you think the mortality rate is? Higher? Lower?

[defacto7]

12. The statistical fatality rate as of today

is 7% up from the 6% rate it's been for a couple weeks, in other words it's statistically rising. The speculative estimate of the final death rate is in the neighborhood of 3.5% to 1% depending on which expert is doing the estimate. .5% is a negligent figure, one used to underestimate the severity of the disease and in the case of some publications, to pacify the market.

edited to change final death rate estimate.

[Celerity]

13. fair enough rationale, and as I stated the Economist tends to be conservative in their estimates.

[defacto7]

14. Thank you. I appreciate your candor.

I need to make sure I stay on the right track.

[Celerity]

15. yw

[dweller]

4. at 7pm March 12

1,670 ... +359 today so far

✌🏼

[ThoughtCriminal]

11. I brought up the fact that the U.S. is following the same pattern as Italy

this morning at work.

After my co-workers realized that I was serious, I got the "Cassandra Treatment".