Virus is likely to spread in U.S.

Health officials issue dire warnings, but White House seems to play down threat

Washington — Trump administration health officials urged the public Tuesday to prepare for the “inevitable” spread of the coronavirus within the United States, escalating warnings about a growing threat from the virus to Americans’ everyday lives.

The warnings from officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and other agencies contrasted sharply with assessments from President Donald Trump and other White House officials, who have largely dismissed concerns about the virus. The mixed messages continued Tuesday, as dire warnings issued to senators and the media early in the day gave way to a more positive assessment, after the Dow Jones industrial average plunged 3.4%, bringing the two-day loss to 1,900 points — the biggest in two years.

“We believe the immediate risk here in the United States remains low and we’re working hard to keep that risk low,” Anne Schuchat, the CDC’s principal deputy director, said during a hastily convened afternoon media briefing.

Earlier in the day, CDC officials and others sounded a more pressing alarm.

“Ultimately, we expect we will see community spread in the United

States. It’s not a question of if this will happen, but when this will happen, and how many people in this country will have severe illnesses,” said Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the CDC, during a morning briefing with reporters.

Messonnier said the rapid surge in cases in new locations outside mainland China in the past several days prompted the change in official warnings.

There is growing evidence that efforts to contain the spread of the virus outside of China have failed. There are now 1,146 cases in South Korea, at least 15 people have died in Iran, and new cases were reported for the first time in Switzerland, Austria, and at a luxury resort in Spain. In the United States, there are now 57 people with the virus, all but 14 of them evacuees from the Diamond Princess cruise ship.

Messonnier noted the spread of new cases without a known source of exposure in multiple nations. Evidence of what’s called “community spread,” she said, is triggering new strategies to confront the respiratory virus, including urging businesses, health care facilities and even schools to plan now for ways to limit the impact of the illness when it spreads in the community.

Health leaders voiced similar warnings in a closed-door briefing Tuesday morning for senators. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said officials had cautioned them that there was a “very strong chance of an extremely serious outbreak of the coronavirus here in the United States.”

Not long thereafter, though, National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow went on TV to try to assuage concerns over the coronavirus and its impact on the U.S. economy, saying, “we have contained this. I won’t say [it’s] airtight, but it’s pretty close to airtight,” Kudlow told CNBC’s Kelly Evans on “The Exchange.”

Even top GOP lawmakers struggled to explain the inconsistent messages coming from the administration.

“I can’t comment on what the White House has been saying on this, because the people who work for the White House are not saying that,” said Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo.

The chaotic messaging threatened to obscure urgent public health advice coming from the CDC early Tuesday, when officials said the agency would be focusing on containing the spread of the virus in the United States, as well as warning people to prepare.

“Disruptions to everyday life may be severe, but people might want to start thinking about that now,” said Messonnier, a top CDC health official. She said parents may want to call their local school offices to see what kinds of plans they have in place and consider options for child care. Messonnier added that she called her children’s superintendent office to find out what plans the school system had.

Businesses need to consider replacing in-person meetings with telework, Messonnier said. Schools should consider ways to limit face-to-face contact, such as dividing students into smaller groups, Internet-based learning, or even closing schools. Local officials should consider modifying, postponing or canceling large gatherings. Hospitals should consider ways to triage patients who do not need urgent care and recommend patients delay surgery that isn’t absolutely necessary.

Some senators who attended Tuesday’s closed-door briefing downplayed any alarmist tone from health officials. However, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said senators were told the number of cases in the United States would inevitably grow.

“What we heard was that it’s inevitable that we’ll have more than 14 cases as time goes on,” Alexander said. “And what we’ll have to try to do is the same thing we’ve already done through quarantining and monitoring through our public health system to limit that as much as possible.”

Sen. John Neely Kennedy, R-La., criticized the lawmaker briefing, because he said that while issuing dire warnings, officials could not answer his basic questions.

“I thought a lot of the briefing was bull——,” Kennedy said. “They would answer the question but dodge, bob and weave. I understand there’s a lot they don’t know. I get that.

But they need to answer the questions straight up.”

Blunt, Kennedy and Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, were among GOP senators who told health officials about concerns during the closed-door briefing, including the level of spending the administration is prepared to commit, the adequacy of preparations, and the length of time for development of a vaccine.

“I’m very disappointed in the preparation that’s been done over the last few years anticipating the potential of an outbreak of substance,”

Romney said later.

Traveling in India this week, Trump said the U.S. was “very close to a vaccine.” While top health officials have praised the record speed with which they expect to get a coronavirus vaccine into early clinical safety tests, it will likely be at least a year or year and a half before the vaccine is widely available, said Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fauci said Tuesday that he expected the vaccine to begin testing within a month and a half if there are no glitches.