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Sun, 15th Mar 2020 17:23:00 |
Coronavirus: Trump's stumbles and testing failures pave way to disaster, experts say |
The US is on course to be severely ravaged by the coronavirus outbreak due to a delayed and dysfunctional testing regime and misleading messaging from the Trump administration, public health experts have warned.
As of Friday, there were more than 1,600 confirmed cases of the Covid-19 virus across the US, with 41 deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control. However, the actual number of infected Americans is certain to be far higher, with the true toll obscured by a calamitous lack of testing.
A lack of planning and restrictions that barred testing people without symptoms, even though the virus can be asymptomatic for some time, or those not arriving from overseas virus hotspots has needlessly worsened the situation, critics said.
Why has coronavirus testing in the US been such a disaster?
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In the period from last Sunday until Wednesday morning, the CDC tested just 77 people in the US. By stark comparison the Utah Jazz basketball team alone managed to test 58 people as the NBA, along with scores of schools, Broadway shows and various other cultural and sporting events were shut down. Even in Washington state, where 31 people have died, health officials have had to ration test kits.
On 31 January the Trump administration restricted travel from China, where Covid-19 originated, but then efforts to ramp up testing and ensure containment stalled. In a key setback, the administration rejected World Health Organization testing kits in favor of developing its own, which turned out to be faulty.
"The response has been frustrating and disappointing," said Thomas Chen-chia Tsai, a surgeon in Boston and faculty member of the Harvard Global Health Institute. "The strict quarantine measures in China bought the rest of the world a few weeks of time but in the US we were on the sidelines rather than reacting. It was a missed opportunity. If there was a targeted response we'd be in a very different position now.
"The US government didn't want to cause panic but Americans panic when there they sense there's no plan. That vacuum creates panic."
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