“We’ve seen press conferences like this before… They’ve promised mass testing sites at Wal-Mart parking lots…a nationwide website…No one is buying it anymore.”
Today, Protect Our Care’s Coronavirus War Room issued the following statement in anticipation of President Donald Trump’s press conference with supply chain distributors this afternoon at the White House:
“No PR stunt can change the fact that Donald Trump is directly responsible for the spiraling health and economic crisis. When the virus was first emerging from China, he failed to listen to experts and prepare our nation by ensuring we had enough tests, personal protective equipment like masks and lifesaving supplies like ventilators,” said Coronavirus War Room Director Zac Petkanas.
“Instead of taking decisive action two months ago when he should have federalized the medical supply chain and broadly invoked the Defense Production Act, he downplayed the crisis by giving false information that confused the public and hampered the response. As a result, our hospitals are now overwhelmed, millions of Americans have lost their jobs and families are needlessly losing loved ones.
“We’ve seen press conferences like this before. They’ve promised mass testing sites at Wal-Mart parking lots and a nationwide website to help Americans determine whether their symptoms were serious. Every time it’s been nothing but smoke and mirrors.
“The American people have no more patience for press conferences touting promises that never seem to pan out. No one is buying it anymore. They are demanding that Donald Trump get masks, ventilators, tests and gloves to healthcare workers putting their lives on the line to combat this crisis. It’s time for him to do his job.”
BACKGROUND ON TRUMP FAILED PROMISES
Lied About Testing Availability: Trump claimed that anyone could get a test when they remain largely unavailable to the general public.
- WaPo: Trump promised scores of big-box retailers would offer parking lots for covid-19 testing. There are only five of them.
Lied About Vaccines: Trump claimed we were close to a coronavirus vaccine when public health officials say it’s at least a year away.
- Politico: Trump gets a fact check on coronavirus vaccines — from his own officials
Lied About Website: Trump claimed he was about to launch a website to help Americans find out if they needed a test and where to find one. There is no such website. Instead, Google launched a coronavirus awareness website that performs neither function the president claimed it would.
- FactCheck.Org: Trump Misrepresents Google Coronavirus Website
Lied About Health Insurance Copayments: Trump claimed he got health insurance executives to eliminate all copayments for COVID-19. This was false. They were only waiving copayments for the tests, not the expensive treatments.
- PolitiFact: Trump wrongly said insurance companies will waive co-pays for coronavirus treatments
BACKGROUND ON HOW TRUMP FAILED TO PREPARE THE NATION
Dropped The Ball On Testing:
- South Korea was able to test 287,000 people eight weeks after its first confirmed coronavirus case. The United States was only able to test 55,000 people in the same time frame.
- As of today at 9:30 AM, South Korea had conducted Coronavirus tests on roughly 1-In-130 people while the United States has only tested roughly 1-In-430 people.
Dropped The Ball On Preparing Hospitals With Protective Equipment, Other Supplies:
- Trump ignored a 69 page National Security Council playbook that said the Administration should have begun procuring personal protective equipment at least two months ago.
- A Society of Critical Care report noted that the United States currently has between 160,000 and 200,000 ventilators, but could need as many as a million over the course of the outbreak.
- The New England Journal of Medicine warned that there may be as many as 31 patients in need of ventilation per ventilator available in the United States.
- The CDC has instructed healthcare workers to use bandanas and scarves to protect themselves because there aren’t enough masks.
- Hospitals are being forced to consider do-not-resuscitate orders for coronavirus patients because there are not enough masks and gloves to protect doctors and nurses.
- Donald Trump waited until doctors already faced life-threatening shortages of medical supplies to even consider using the Defense Production Act.
Left America Vulnerable Before The Virus Struck:
- In January, he ignored the classified briefings from his own intelligence officials warning him about the outbreak.
- He eliminated and didn’t replace the White House Global Pandemic Response team.
- He tried to cut the global health section of the CDC, laying off staff and closing 80% of epidemic prevention activities that were designed to combat public health crises like this one.
- He eliminated a key CDC position focused on detecting disease outbreaks in China and cut the staff at the Beijing office of the CDC by two thirds.
Donald Trump Has Not Learned From His Mistakes:
- Trump is facing heavy criticism from public health experts, Republian allies like Rep. Liz Cheney and business leaders like the US Chamber of Commerce for contradicting the advice of public health experts by saying he’s going to ease social distancing prematurely.
- Trump reaffirmed that he is still trying to overturn the Affordable Care Act, suing in court to take health care coverage away from tens of millions of Americans at a time when they need it most.