With a “disturbing surge of infections” in coronavirus cases nationwide, Dr. Tony Fauci testified before Congress last Tuesday that the next two weeks will be critical in controlling the spread.
The country has seen an increase in cases nationwide over the last two weeks, with the biggest in Oregon, Oklahoma, Florida, Texas and Arizona, where President Donald Trump visited last week. In coming weeks, with hospitalizations also rising in many states, so too could deaths.
Alas, at this critical moment, when Americans desperately need a clear and sober voice to guide them, the president is again sowing seeds of confusion.
At his superspreader rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he boasted of telling his team to “slow down testing.” Then the White House claimed he was joking. Later, Trump declared, “I don’t kid.”
In their testimony, Fauci, CDC head Robert Redfield, testing czar Adm. Brett Giroir and FDA chief Stephen Hahn all agreed that they had not been told to slow down; they all urged more testing.
Yet Sen. Chuck Schumer separately asked the Department of Health and Human Services why at least $8 billion Congress authorized in pandemic response aid to the states, specifically for testing, had yet to be released.
In his testimony, Fauci again encouraged the following of CDC guidelines, especially by young people, including continued use of masks and social distancing. Of course, Trump’s Arizona “youth rally” had little distancing and few masks.
With no coherent leadership at the top, is there any wonder that a deadly pandemic is now resurgent?
— New York Daily News