'Thanks to the quarantine, St. Louis’ death rate in 1918 was lowest among major U.S. cities. In Philadelphia, where bodies piled up on sidewalks when the morgues overflowed, the death rate was nearly twice as high.'
- Context:
(BBC) Coronavirus confirmed as pandemic by World Health Organization - 'He said he was "deeply concerned" by "alarming levels of inaction" over the virus.' - 'The case of the Netherlands..''This could be the greatest crisis faced by President Trump. But not only is he obviously incapable of handling the problem, he has already done tremendous damage to America's pandemic response system. The United States is highly vulnerable to epidemic disease because the president is a corrupt, tyrannical moron who can't do the job.''The global spread of coronavirus is verging on pandemic status. While the rate of new infection appears to be slowing in China thanks to drastic mass quarantines and clampdowns on movement, other outbreaks in Iran, South Korea, and Italy have still not been controlled. On Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) warned that an outbreak in the United States was probably just a matter of time.
This could be the greatest crisis faced by President Trump. But not only is he obviously incapable of handling the problem, he has already done tremendous damage to America's pandemic response system. The United States is highly vulnerable to epidemic disease because the president is a corrupt, tyrannical moron who can't do the job.
As I wrote earlier this week, Trump's model of governance is classic authoritarian corruption. He has stacked the bureaucracy with cronies whose only qualification is personal loyalty to Trump. He's recently charged a former college football quarterback with purging the civil service of Trump critics, and appointed Richard Grenell — a man with no intelligence experience who illegally lobbied for Hungary without registering as a foreign agent — as acting director of national intelligence.
Now, Trump is responding to bad news about COVID-19 (WHO's more accurate name for coronavirus) in typical authoritarian fashion — with denial. In a tweet, he insisted the media was hyping the problem to bring down the stock market.'
- The Week, Trump's coronavirus response is worse than incompetent, February 26, 2020
ContextPope limits public blessings to help against virus spread, March 7, 2020
(China, Europe, US mismanagement) - Coronavirus: Wuhan doctor speaks out against authorities(CNN, Covid-19) - '..This is a time for pulling out all the stops..' - WHO chief Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus