The United States has squandered resources it needs to fight coronavirus
The United States is on the verge of being ravaged by an invader which we have far too little resources to confront. New estimates from the United Kingdom are predicting 2.2 million deaths in the United States from an unmitigated coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic. Many believe that this epidemic will only affect the elderly. However, the young can become very sick, with 5 percent requiring ICU care. If our healthcare system is overrun, this care will not be available to all. In Italy, there are reports of those over 80 not being placed on ventilators. In addition, critical care survivors, including the young, may well develop pulmonary fibrosis, a disabling chronic lung disease. And if you smoke you are probably at an even higher risk.
In 2018, the federal government disbanded the National Security Council’s epidemic response task force including the White House’s infrastructure and eliminated over $15 billion in overseas disease funding. The CDC, the experts who have risked their lives for decades handling epidemics, was early to sound the alarm, warning of major disruptions in public life. They now appear to have been sidelined and are absent from the podium of Washington DC press conferences. The CDC should be placed as the lead agency in implementing a uniform mandatory national response. Instead, their budget has repeatedly been decreased, with the White House’s 2020 proposed budget decreasing over 10 percent from the previous year.
But this neglect has not been just a recent phenomenon. The United States has less hospital beds than Italy (2.8 verses 3.2 beds per 1,000 residents). And far less than Japan (13.2 beds per 1000 residents). We even reduced bed capacity from the previous reported year.
After the 2009 H1N1 epidemic, 85 million viral filtering masks (N95) were used from the National Strategic Stockpile. They were not replaced. The current stockpile has 12 million N95 masks and another 5 million which are out of date. We also have far too few ventilators and ICU beds. We also need to remember that many of these are being used by flu victims. Coronavirus requirements will be on top of what is needed to confront the flu.
And some of our national leaders were in denial, calling the respected NIH scientist and taskforce member, Dr. Anthony Fauci, a fearmonger and COVID-19 dangers “exaggerated by those who seek to profit”.
A major impediment to controlling this virus is asymptomatic spread. Eighteen percent of the Diamond Princess cruise line passengers who tested positive for the virus were without symptoms, and some reports indicate that 50 percent of those infected became so from an asymptomatic carrier.
Presently, the United States is implementing a patchwork on non-mandatory social distancing, which large segments of our population are not complying with. Although face masks may not always prevent the spread of the virus to the wearer, they are of utmost importance in preventing an infected person from spreading the virus. To blunt this epidemic, we need to have enough N95s for the general public, some of whom may be asymptomatic carriers. Presently we have nowhere near enough for our healthcare workers.
A drastic change in our priorities needs to take place. Highly profitable healthcare systems have squandered money on activities such as advertising while reducing stockpiles of supplies.
We will not be able to stop this epidemic, but we may be able to slow it down, hopefully preventing our healthcare system from being overrun. Even if infections subside in the summer it will likely be back in the fall, as happened with the 1918 Spanish flue epidemic, because the virus has already spread to the southern hemisphere. Vaccine development is key to stopping this epidemic.
I was asked if healthcare executives will be held accountable. Probably not. Similar to what happened to bank executives in the 2008 financial collapse, I predict our healthcare system will be given a massive federal bailout and executives complimented on how they handled this crisis.
Kevin Kavanagh of Somerset is a retired physician and board chairman of Health Watch USA.
This story was originally published March 24, 2020 at 1:14 PM.