The former health secretary and Kansas governor says the White House has abdicated its responsibilities to lead on the coronavirus outbreak
Beyond that, there are things that are uniquely in the purview of the federal government. And disaster response is one of them. In this case, every state needed the feds from the outset. And what has been terrifying to watch is that the federal government has refused to use the unique purchasing authority, the unique production authority, and the national logistics system that no state can mobilize.
The National Security folks knew in December that something was happening and began to raise a lot of red flags about the pathogen appearing in China. Warning, warning, warning, ignored. We can go back to December. The ban on Chinese travel that happened at the end of January was somewhat effective, although there seemed to have been lots of trips before it was put on. But let’s assume that’s effective.
Under the HHS umbrella, there are 11 operating agencies. FDA is one of them. The CDC is another; they’re both under the same framework of the department. And I can guarantee you that not only can the secretary get their attention, but the White House has a unique way to get agencies’ attention: by making it very clear that a challenge is urgent and they want a solution — and [to call a meeting with] everybody at the table with that solution within 24 hours. It can happen.
And for the first time I thought, “Oh, dear God, this situation with testing is intentional.” We don’t want there to be a lot of tests, we’re slow-walking tests, because the only thing that’s going to happen with testing is the numbers, of course, are going to go up. You will find more cases. You will find the asymptomatic cases. And I remember thinking: “I don’t like to be a conspiracy theorist, but there really may be a reason that we seem to be fumbling on these tests.
Wow. Every day. Every day. We’re again at a pivotal moment. I found it terrifying that the president on a Monday [April 13] said, “I have” to order reopening. “I have to order what needs to happen. I will lay it out. It’s only my authority.” Again, totally wrong. I don’t know what Constitution he is reading or quoting. That is not the way our system of government works.
We have a very good model of how you do contact tracing — public-health epidemiologists have done this for decades with HIV, sometimes in low-income neighborhoods for prenatal care. We know how to do it, but it takes trained employees. It takes money to put a data system together that’s effective and easy to use. And right now, particularly with the tax deadlines having been pushed out, with the states losing money, and payroll taxes falling fast, state revenues are really hurting.
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