U.S. health officials urge Americans to prepare for spread of coronavirus

[webfact]

U.S. health officials urge Americans to prepare for spread of coronavirus

By Julie Steenhuysen and Diane Bartz

 

FILE PHOTO: United States Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar, and NCIRD Director doctor Nancy Messonnier speak about the public health response to the outbreak of the coronavirus during a news conference at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in Washington, U.S., January 28, 2020. REUTERS/Amanda Voisard./File Photo

 

WASHINGTON/CHICAGO (Reuters) - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday alerted Americans to begin preparing for the spread of coronavirus in the United States after infections surfaced in several more countries.

 

The announcement signalled a change in tone for the Atlanta-based U.S. health agency, which had largely been focused on efforts to stop the virus from entering the country and quarantining individuals travelling from China.

 

"The data over the past week about the spread in other countries has raised our level of concern and expectation that we are going to have community spread here," Dr. Nancy Messonnier, the CDC's head of respiratory diseases, told reporters on a conference call.

 

What is not known, she said, is when it will arrive and how severe a U.S. outbreak might be. "Disruption to everyday life might be severe" and businesses, schools and families should begin having discussions about the possible impact from the spread of the virus, Messonnier cautioned.

 

In a teleconference later on Tuesday, Dr. Anne Schuchat, the CDC's principal deputy director, said that while the immediate risk in the United States was low, the current global situation suggested a pandemic was likely.

 

"It's not a question of if. It's a question of when and how many people will be infected," Schuchat said.

 

Separately, U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar told a Senate subcommittee there will likely be more cases in the United States, and he asked lawmakers to approve $2.5 billion in funding to fight the outbreak after proposing cuts to the department's budget.

 

"While the immediate risk to individual members of the American public remains low, there is now community transmission in a number of countries, including outside of Asia, which is deeply concerning," Azar said, adding that recent outbreaks in Iran and Italy were particularly worrying.

 

Believed to have originated from illegal wildlife sold in the Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, the new coronavirus has infected some 80,000 people and killed close to 2,700 in China.

 

Although the World Health Organization says the epidemic has peaked in China, coronavirus cases have surfaced in about 30 other countries, with some three dozen deaths reported, according to a Reuters tally.

 

Growing outbreaks in Iran, Italy and South Korea have raised concerns that coronavirus will surface in other nations and worsen in those that have already reported infections, further denting a global economy that had already been hit by a dependence on China.

 

Global and U.S. stock markets fell sharply again on Tuesday, as investors feared the epidemic would further damage an already slowing world economy.

The White House's top economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said the U.S. economy would be able to ride out any disruption from the global spread of coronavirus, adding that he did not expect the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates to blunt the disease's economic impact.

 

U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer, however, said Republican President Donald Trump and his administration had been caught "flat-footed" and lacked a comprehensive plan to deal with the coronavirus. He called for at least $3.1 billion in additional funding to fight it.

 

"The Trump administration has shown towering and dangerous incompetence when it comes to the coronavirus," said Schumer, the Senate's top Democrat. "Mr. President, you need to get your act together now. This is a crisis."

 

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said it would be at least a year before a coronavirus vaccine could be made available to the public.

 

But Fauci said testing Gilead Sciences' antiviral drug remdesivir for potential treatment of coronavirus could be done in a "reasonable amount of time."

 

'DEADLY CONSEQUENCES'

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that Iran may have covered up information about the spread of coronavirus there, and he accused China of mishandling the epidemic through its "censorship" of media and medical professionals.

 

"The United States is deeply concerned by information indicating the Iranian regime may have suppressed vital details about the outbreak in that country," Pompeo told reporters as Iran's coronavirus death toll rose to 16.

 

"All nations, including Iran, should tell the truth about the coronavirus and cooperate with international aid organizations," Pompeo said.

 

His remarks, coming less than two months after a short-lived U.S.-Iranian military clash and the signing of a U.S.-China trade deal, could inflame tensions with Tehran and Beijing.

 

Beijing last week revoked the credentials of three Wall Street Journal correspondents over a column China said was racist. The United States has said it was considering a range of responses to their expulsion.

 

"Expelling our journalists exposes once again the government's issue that led to SARS and now the coronavirus: namely censorship. It can have deadly consequences," Pompeo said, referring to the 2002-2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which also emerged from China.

 

"If China permitted its own and foreign journalists and medical personnel to speak and investigate freely, Chinese officials and other nations would have been far better prepared to address the challenge" of coronavirus, he added.

 

Despite the coronavirus epidemic, Pompeo said the United States still planned to host a special meeting with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Las Vegas in March.

 

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago, Humeyra Pamuk, Richard Cowan, Susan Heavey, Tim Ahmann and Diane Bartz in Washington, Michael Erman in New York and Manas Mishra in Bangalore; Writing by Paul Simao; Editing by Bill Berkrot and Jonathan Oatis)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-02-26

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[Emdog]

Put your head between your knees and kiss your ass goodbye.

Some may need to sign up for yoga classes in preparation

[Boon Mee]

Schumer says "towering incompetence", huh? 

Clearly, he's referring to himself and his fellow Democrats. 

[IAMHERE]

I bet if the Aliens show up next month the democrats will blame Trump. 

[earlinclaifornia]

Idiot trump's reciptiant of the Medal of Freedom say's:

 

https://www.yahoo.com/news/rush-limbaugh-under-fire-claiming-155922731.html

 

You can't make this stuff up. trump is on the way out.

Edited February 26, 2020 by earlinclaifornia
speling

[Tug]

But I thought the very stable genius said not to worry!! Maybe that’s why he’s defunding the cdc and po poing science 

[Berkshire]

Trump seems to be more concerned about the stock market slide than anything else.  In Trump's mind:  "If not for the CDC, we wouldn't have a coronavirus problem.  Get rid of the CDC!" 

[Skallywag]

Annual influenza deaths in the USA 12,000 - 61,000

Deaths from Covid19,  zero in the USA

Covid19 deaths in China 3% of those infected.  Nothing out of normal range for any influenza.  Epidemic threshold is above 7.3% according to CDC

 

14 infected U.S. citizens flown back to U.S. from the Diamond Princess cruise ship a few days ago.  Now CDC say spread of virus is imminent.  Wow - any cause and effect happening here?

 

Stay tuned, Stay safe, and Stay healthy (how I dont know)

Peace

 

 

[zydeco]

Trump's Katrina is right over the horizon.

[URMySunshine]

1 hour ago, zydeco said:

Trump's Katrina is right over the horizon.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/feb/26/coronavirus-latest-updates-who-mission-director-warns-world-is-simply-not-ready

Edited February 26, 2020 by URMySunshine

[Eric Loh]

Trump is only putting his own county in a state of unpreparedness to deal with the fast spreading Coronavirus with his free wheeling, careless and thoughtless comment. 
https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21153035/coronavirus-response-trump-vaccine-covid19-cdc-who-health-crisis

[Redline]

Well, at least they aren’t bull<deleted>ing 

[placnx]

9 hours ago, webfact said:

Beijing last week revoked the credentials of three Wall Street Journal correspondents over a column China said was racist. The United States has said it was considering a range of responses to their expulsion.

Maybe the real reason for the expulsion was that one of them reported on the activities of Xi's relative in Australia, plus the recent classification of Xinhua people is the US as foreign agents. Perhaps US could expel Xinhua, People's Daily proportionately, so that since China has four times the population, US expels 12 Xinhua operatives!

[bkk6060]

9 hours ago, webfact said:

(HHS) Secretary Alex Azar told a Senate subcommittee there will likely be more cases in the United States, and he asked lawmakers to approve $2.5 billion in funding to fight the outbreak after proposing cuts to the department's budget

This is the main reason for this scare mongering.

2.5 billion for what?

All about the money..

[howbri]

5 hours ago, earlinclaifornia said:

Idiot trump's reciptiant of the Medal of Freedom say's:

 

https://www.yahoo.com/news/rush-limbaugh-under-fire-claiming-155922731.html

 

You can't make this stuff up. trump is on the way out.

In your dreams! MAGA

[sqwakvfr]

“But I thought the very stable genius said not to worry!! Maybe that’s why he’s defunding the cdc and po poing science ”

 

The Center for Disease Controls current annual budget is over 11 Billion. When was the CDC defunded?  Asking for 2.5 Billion now to combat Covid 19 appears to be a proper first step.  The Federal Government is not perfect but most of the time they do a good job in responding to major events.  

[bristolboy]

42 minutes ago, Nyezhov said:

Sounds like you guys are totally happy with this brouhaha...nothing like a "crisis" at election time.

 

We are all gonna die someday, and Im sure my heirs would love it if I kicked at a stock market high. YMMV.

 

But, I prepare. I wash my hands constantly and practice the same personal regimin I do during flue season. PLus Im avoiding crowds and airplanes...and China.

 

 

I guess when you've got nothing to go with, attack the motives of the messenger. The fact is Trump eradicated a whole pandemic infrastructure that was created under Obama. 

 

"When Ebola broke out in West Africa in 2014, President Barack Obama recognized that responding to the outbreak overseas, while also protecting Americans at home, involved multiple U.S. government departments and agencies, none of which were speaking to one another. Basically, the U.S. pandemic infrastructure was an enormous orchestra full of talented, egotistical players, each jockeying for solos and fame, refusing to rehearse, and demanding higher salaries—all without a conductor. To bring order and harmony to the chaos, rein in the agency egos, and create a coherent multiagency response overseas and on the homefront, Obama anointed a former vice presidential staffer, Ronald Klain, as a sort of “epidemic czar” inside the White House, clearly stipulated the roles and budgets of various agencies, and placed incident commanders in charge in each Ebola-hit country and inside the United States."

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/31/coronavirus-china-trump-united-states-public-health-emergency-response/

Apparently the problem with this system is that it was created under Obama.

 

 

 

 

[metisdead]

An off topic post and a reply has been removed.

 

A post using trolling comments toward President Trump and Larry Kudlow has been removed as well as the replies.

[URMySunshine]

Covid-19 is self-evidently beyond the point of meaningful containment. Virologists and infectious disease experts have known for three weeks that this was highly probable, and certainly not a mere tail-risk as suggested by equity market pricing. We are now there.

 

The global economy may be heading for some sort of "sudden stop" in supply chains, trade flows and tourism more akin to the outbreak of the First World War than the Lehman or dotcom crises.

 

Gonna be carnage in the markets today. 

 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/02/25/coronavirus-threatens-global-economy-sudden-stop/?li_source=LI&li_medium=li-recommendation-widget

 

Edited February 26, 2020 by URMySunshine

[stevenl]

5 hours ago, Skallywag said:

Annual influenza deaths in the USA 12,000 - 61,000

Deaths from Covid19,  zero in the USA

Covid19 deaths in China 3% of those infected.  Nothing out of normal range for any influenza.  Epidemic threshold is above 7.3% according to CDC

 

14 infected U.S. citizens flown back to U.S. from the Diamond Princess cruise ship a few days ago.  Now CDC say spread of virus is imminent.  Wow - any cause and effect happening here?

 

Stay tuned, Stay safe, and Stay healthy (how I dont know)

Peace

 

 

 

For once I partly agree with you. The panic is doing a lot more harm than the virus itself.

 

But how many of the 14 infected US citizens infected other US citizens?

[riclag]

8 hours ago, Boon Mee said:

Schumer says "towering incompetence", huh? 

Clearly, he's referring to himself and his fellow Democrats. 

 

Dividing Americans to gain power for a party going potentially communist!  Can he ever stop at the chance to ridicule the POTUS!

The USA would be a whole lot better without CA and NY representation from the divide and conquer dems!

JC ,Chuck work with us!!!!!!

Edited February 26, 2020 by riclag

[earlinclaifornia]

1 hour ago, sqwakvfr said:

“But I thought the very stable genius said not to worry!! Maybe that’s why he’s defunding the cdc and po poing science ”

 

The Center for Disease Controls current annual budget is over 11 Billion. When was the CDC defunded?  Asking for 2.5 Billion now to combat Covid 19 appears to be a proper first step.  The Federal Government is not perfect but most of the time they do a good job in responding to major events.  

 In 2018, the Trump administration fired the government’s entire pandemic response chain of command. One of many reversals he took trying to get to Obama's accomplishments.

 

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/31/coronavirus-china-trump-united-states-public-health-emergency-response/

[earlinclaifornia]

10 minutes ago, riclag said:

 

Dividing Americans to gain power for a party going potentially communist!  Can he ever stop at the chance to ridicule the POTUS!

The USA would be a whole lot better without CA and NY representation from the divide and conquer dems!

JC ,Chuck work with us!!!!!!

Not funny your suggesting CA and NY representation are the dividers when it is always trump himself

[URMySunshine]

12 minutes ago, riclag said:

 

Dividing Americans to gain power for a party going potentially communist!  Can he ever stop at the chance to ridicule the POTUS!

The USA would be a whole lot better without CA and NY representation from the divide and conquer dems!

JC ,Chuck work with us!!!!!!

Don't worry POTUS has said it will be all done by April. And he is never wrong and never lies. 

[URMySunshine]

48 minutes ago, earlinclaifornia said:

 In 2018, the Trump administration fired the government’s entire pandemic response chain of command. One of many reversals he took trying to get to Obama's accomplishments.

 

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/31/coronavirus-china-trump-united-states-public-health-emergency-response/

The incompetent hubris of the man is both breathtaking and chilling particularly so in the current climate. He takes all the credit for the stock market advances so logically all the reversals are his as well. 

[zydeco]

Trump has just tweeted that the coronavirus is a conspiracy to cause him to lose the election and panic the markets. What an utter selfish man. I've said for over two years now that the only thing Trump cares about are his precious stock markets. This is the proof. He plans a press conference to label all the corona news as "fake news."  All to save the bubble markets and his own skin. He would rather leave Americans unprepared and dying than lose 10,000 points on the Dow.

[unsubscribe]

10 hours ago, zydeco said:

Trump's Katrina is right over the horizon.

100% this. 

 

His presidency is fully dependent upon the economy (and in his view the economy = dow jones)

His administration is already making Katrina like missteps:

- SD official forcing infected disaster princess americans on plane with uninfected against CDC advice

- Trump stating that a vaccine is almost ready (later to be corrected.. "he meant ebola vaccine!")

- complete botching of test kits

- Kudlow breaking with CDC on coronavirus: ‘We have contained this’

 

Not to mention when people become sick in droves and going to get care bankrupts them, it sure does make that wacky socialist with plans of 'medicare for all' seem awfully appealing.

Edited February 26, 2020 by unsubscribe

[unsubscribe]

5 hours ago, URMySunshine said:

Covid-19 is self-evidently beyond the point of meaningful containment. Virologists and infectious disease experts have known for three weeks that this was highly probable, and certainly not a mere tail-risk as suggested by equity market pricing. We are now there.

 

The global economy may be heading for some sort of "sudden stop" in supply chains, trade flows and tourism more akin to the outbreak of the First World War than the Lehman or dotcom crises.

 

Gonna be carnage in the markets today. 

 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/02/25/coronavirus-threatens-global-economy-sudden-stop/?li_source=LI&li_medium=li-recommendation-widget

 

The fed won't be able to print their way out of this one.... but I'm sure they will try, I wouldn't be surprised if we eventually end up in negative interest rate land.

[earlinclaifornia]

10 hours ago, unsubscribe said:

100% this. 

 

His presidency is fully dependent upon the economy (and in his view the economy = dow jones)

His administration is already making Katrina like missteps:

- SD official forcing infected disaster princess americans on plane with uninfected against CDC advice

- Trump stating that a vaccine is almost ready (later to be corrected.. "he meant ebola vaccine!")

- complete botching of test kits

- Kudlow breaking with CDC on coronavirus: ‘We have contained this’

 

Not to mention when people become sick in droves and going to get care bankrupts them, it sure does make that wacky socialist with plans of 'medicare for all' seem awfully appealing.

Stock market nose diving. trump will lose the election because of healthcare alone.

Vote anybody but trump.   Keep America Alive

Edited February 27, 2020 by earlinclaifornia

[JimmyTheMook]

5 minutes ago, earlinclaifornia said:

Stock market nose diving. trump will lose the election because of healthcare alone.

Vote anybody but trump.   Keep America Alive

 

o'rly ?

 

Maybe Bernie