Case Study In Incompetence: Trump's Coronavirus Reponse

(Lalo Alcaraz, LA Weekly)

The Washington Post goes inside the floundering response of the Trump regime to catch up to the coronavirus pandemic.  We've highlighted key phrases and words:

The economy was grinding to a halt. Stocks were in free fall. Schools were closing. Public events were being canceled. New cases of the novel coronavirus were popping up across the country.

And then, on Wednesday, the day the World Health Organization designated the coronavirus a pandemic, Jared Kushner joined the tumult.

President Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser — who has zero expertise in infectious diseases and little experience marshaling the full bureaucracy behind a cause — saw the administration floundering and inserted himself at the helm, believing he could break the logjam of internal dysfunction.

Kushner rushed to help write Trump’s widely panned Oval Office address to the nation. His supermodel sister-in-law’s father, Kurt Kloss, an emergency room doctor, crowdsourced suggestions from his Facebook network to pass along to Kushner. And Kushner pressed tech executives to help build a testing website and retail executives to help create mobile testing sites — but the projects were only half-baked when Trump revealed them Friday in the White House Rose Garden.

Kushner entered into a crisis management process that, despite the triumphant and self-congratulatory tone of public briefings, was as haphazard and helter-skelter as the chaotic early days of Trump’s presidency — turning into something of a family-and-friends pandemic response operation.

The administration’s struggle to mitigate the coronavirus outbreak has been marked by infighting and blame-shifting, misinformation and missteps, and a slow recognition of the danger. Warring factions have wrestled for control internally and for approval from a president who has been preoccupied with the beating his image is taking.

Remember, this is all after the "original sin" that the Trump regime committed of closing the coordinating mechanism in the White House for pandemic response. And, though warned months ago about the likelihood of a pandemic, they nevertheless opted not to focus on mobilizing the nation's health resources (testing kits, quarantine protocols, more ventilators and ICU beds, etc), for fear of spooking the markets and damaging the one selling point Trump thought he could claim for re- election-- economic prosperity.  How's that working out for them?!

So, for all but the most tuned- out, clueless and/ or tribal, this is an evolving case study in incompetence on a massive, deadly scale.  Among the most infuriating observations is that the Trump regime ignored a Centers for Disease Control (CDC) manual on precisely how to communicate in a crisis situation:

Amid an outbreak where vaccines, drug treatments and even sufficient testing don’t yet exist, communication that is delivered early, accurately and credibly is the strongest medicine in the government’s arsenal.

But the Trump administration’s zigzagging, defensive, inconsistent messages about the novel coronavirus continued Friday, breaking almost every rule in the book and eroding the most powerful weapon officials possess: Public trust.

After disastrous communications during the 2001 anthrax attacks — when white powder in envelopes sparked widespread panic — the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention created a 450-page manual outlining how U.S. leaders should talk to the public during crises.

Protecting vulnerable people from a virus that, according to some projections, could infect millions and kill hundreds of thousands, depends on U.S. leaders issuing clear public health instructions and the public’s trust to follow directions that could save their lives.

“Sometimes it seems like they have literally thrown out the book,” said Joshua Sharfstein, a former top FDA official and Johns Hopkins University professor who is using the CDC manual to teach a crisis communication class. “We’re studying what to do — and at times seeing what not to do — on the same day.” [snip]

The fundamental principles behind good public health communication are almost stunningly simple: Be consistent. Be accurate. Don’t withhold vital information, the CDC manual says. And above all, don’t let anyone onto the podium without the preparation, knowledge and discipline to deliver vital health messages.

Experts say that means not having multiple messengers jockeying for attention with completely different information. It means not overly reassuring people in the face of a threat that is likely to sicken many and kill some. It also means expressing empathy while also delivering information that may be scary. Tell people what they can and should do at an individual level to help those who are at greatest risk.

Respected professionals like Dr. Anthony Fauci are struggling to be accurate, straightforward and transparent in their communications with the public, but are frequently undermined by a self- interested moron in the Oval Office whose only interest is his own preservation.  If the main lesson for the public from this case study in incompetence isn't "Don't elect an ignorant, failed reality show narcissist to the most important position in the world", we're lost as a nation.