Prepare for global impact of US Covid-19 resurgence
“You’re going to call your own shots,” Trump told the governors. “We’re going to be standing alongside of you.”
Here’s the Machiavellian translation: “It’s my mistake, but your headache. It’s election year, you know.”
Following the Trump administration’s loss of credibility, many states developed their own exit stances, including “Trump- proof” plans in the Tri- State area. Belated mobilization was devastating not just nursing homes, but also prison systems and other dense closed facilities. As perceptive observers noted, this was the next information battlefield in America: “Who gets counted in the coronavirus death toll.”
As I argued in “The Tragedy of Missed Opportunities,” the US mobilization against the pandemic failed, because of a series of factors, including: – Complacency, belated mobilization, inadequate preparedness, poorly enforced lockdowns and failed crisis leadership by the Trump White House – Ineffective monitoring of quarantines and self-quarantines – Faulty test kits and long delays in testing, plus deficient contact tracing – Huge shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) that endangered the lives of frontline health care professionals
– Trade war that caused additional, unwarranted PPE shortages – Failed responses to the outbreak, which have dramatically added to health risks – Misguided media coverage that has contributed to “infodemics” – A “paranoid style of politics” to shift the blame on China and the WHO and its executives ( and the disastrous decision to exit the US from the WHO) – Premature exits from lockdowns; and the list goes on.
These mistakes have been followed by Trump’s decision to exit the US from the WHO, which will compound publichealth risks in the future, both in the US and worldwide.
But the long-term international implications may prove even worse.
US virus exports into Mexico — and beyond
What happens in America will not stay in America. Due to months of fattening rather than flattening the curve and the associated resurgence of Covid- 19 in the US, international exits from lockdowns and global economic recovery are virtually ensured to take a series of new hits when the US eventually returns back to business.
The recent travel ban by the European Union against the US is just a tip of the iceberg. Mexican border-states have raised serious concerns about Americans’ pandemic inflows into the south.
Washington implemented strict inflow protocols against Mexicans in March. Yet, as the virus had its first peak in early spring and is now enjoying its second wave in the US, hundreds of thousands of Americans continue to cross the border into Mexico.
What happens in the US-Mexican border today is just a prelude to what will ensue internationally as US containment failures — followed by secondary virus waves — are likely to be exported around the world.