Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) are concerned that the Covid-19 pandemic is being driven by politics rather than the data and science needed to combat it. The decisions made by government officials rather than scientists have made the devastating reach of the pandemic worse. President Donald Trump was quoted as saying that having over 90,000 dead is a badge of honor rather than a horrific national tragedy. Staff inside the CDC have said the White house has stifled the agencies response to the virus. The white house is also limiting the agencies ability to provide health information to the public. A CDC official put it bluntly, “We’ve been muzzled.”
The work the agency is doing is filtered through a political lens. On March 2, 2020 a CDC internal report found that the virus was being spread locally in 29 countries. Two days later the number jumped to 85 countries. On March 5, 2020 three of the countries affected were in Europe. The CDC was preparing to issue a global travel alert to try and keep the virus from spreading to America. The alert would have urged precautions on all international travel. It was to be posted on the evening of March 5, 2020. The alert was delayed for unexplained reasons. When the White house was told about the spread of the virus in Europe they only wanted to focus on China and not anger Europe.
The CDC alert would not post until March 11, 2020 when Trump announced his restrictions on travel from Europe. Those 6 days were critical in bringing Covid-19 exposure to the east coast of the United States as Europeans flew in to New York. While passengers coming from China were checked, those coming from Europe went unchecked spreading the virus freely.
If the CDC had testing in place they could have found that there were likely cases to be found in America as early as January 2020. Had testing been wide spread at the time, they could have caught the infected people flooding in from Europe.
It would be nice if scientists from the CDC could have daily briefings to keep the Americans informed, but instead we have a president who used the briefings to spew his ideas of injecting light into bodies and taking disinfectants to handle the virus. He has to be corrected at every turn and it would be nice if he just let the experts speak. In the past, the CDC provided important information at briefings to help keep the public safe. During an e coli outbreak in 2018 their investigators got to the root of the problem and offered solid, meaningful and blunt guidance on how to keep it from happening again. However the CDC is not offering the same blunt guidance today in the face of a pandemic.
The virus is spreading like wild fire in retirement homes, veterans hospitals, prisons, and meat packing plants. On May 14, 2020 it was reported that counties with or near meatpacking plants have almost twice the rate of known Covid-19 infections as the national average. Tyson Fresh Meats processing plant in Dakota City, Nebraska had a surge in Covid-19 infections among its 4300 workers. Local mayors were unable to get any answers as to how many cases of the virus are in the meat plant. Workers were not being tested. It was assumed that everyone was infected. Iowa, South Dakota and Nebraska never issued stay at home orders.
The CDC did do an investigation at one of the first meat plant outbreaks in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. However the report isn’t as authoritative as past reports. Instead they offered recommendations that are not required or mandated by the organization. There were loose suggestions that the meat plant could implement if they “if they wanted.” Face masks were recommended but not required. The meat packing plant can easy decide that any CDC suggestions are “not feasible.” The president is of course insisting that all meat packing plants should remain open. So it would seem the CDC has softened its stance. As the “suggestions” are ignored, workers will die.
The White House needs to place blame for over 90,000 deaths. White House trade adviser Peter Navarro publicly blamed the CDC for the testing failures in the United States. Navarro argued that the top health agency, under Dr. Robert Redfield, “let the country down” on testing. President Trump privately threw the CDC under the bus to Republican senators during a lunch on Capitol Hill. He praised his son in law, while blaming the CDC for botched testing. A senior CDC official said, “I would urge the President to understand that to prevent spread we must focus on containment and mitigation. He wants to focus on criticism. We will focus on the science, as we have done from the beginning.”
As of May 20, 2020 the CDC is reporting that 12,601,143 tests have been done with 1,699,375 positive tests reported. 93,533 Americans have died and the nations top Disease Control agency is being sidelined. As I write this, the World Health Organization reported106,000 new cases worldwide. This is the most cases in a single day since the pandemic began.