People pass by the closed New York Public Library on March 15, 2020. (Photo/Xinhua) People on Manhattan Square wear masks on March 7, 2020. New York declared a state emergency over the coronavirus. (Photo/Xinhua)
People queue in the rain outside a supermarket in Chicago to buy food. (Photo/Xinhua: Qian Weizhong)
March 24,2020 -- As of March 17, 2020, there had been 6,233 confirmed cases and 105 deaths due to coronavirus COVID-19 in the United States.
US President Donald Trump declared a national emergency over the coronavirus on March 13, saying that the federal government will invest 50 billion US dollars to help states and local governments fight the epidemic.
However, a renowned US epidemic expert pointed out that some regions in the US have missed the best time to curb the spread of the virus effectively. The White House’s sloppy response has made the public health crisis worsen across the country, triggering a violent criticism from the US media.
US missed best time by sloppy response
Well-known media and some epidemic experts in the US have expressed their concerns over American government’s efforts to contain the epidemic.
The New York Times (NYT) said that the White House would have controlled the epidemic disease if they took effective measures at an earlier stage, but they missed the best time.
The Washington Post published expressed its dissatisfaction in a recent article with the federal government’s ineffective epidemic prevention efforts.
Even though the US has declared a national emergency and issued a travel ban a day before, airports across the US are still in a mess. Obviously, no effective measures have been taken and passengers might face more chances to be infected under this occasion, according to the CNN.
Ashish Jha, professor of global health at Harvard University, said he thinks it’s a devastating failure for the federal government and leaders of the federal government.
Inadequate preparations due to downplaying the epidemic
The NYT said the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) insists on using its self-developed but defective detection kit, rather than that of the same kind early invented by the German medical group, which directly result in the delay of the virus detection.
Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, said at a hearing that the current detection system in the US can’t meet the need.
“It is a defect of our country. People in other countries can easily get access to detection but hard in the US. We have to admit it,” said Fauci
CNN quoted many experts of New York University, saying that the real number of the infected people might be more than the official data.
Apart from the failure of virus detection, the US media also pay attention to the medical and healthcare protection system in the US. The Washington Post published an article recently, saying that the lack of universal medical insurance makes the US fragile in face of such an epidemic.
US applies travel ban against epidemic areas
Due to the spread of CODVID-19, the White House declared a travel ban on the United Kingdom and Ireland on March 14. And President Trump decided to suspend travel between countries of Shengen Area and the US for 30 days.
The European Union (EU) leader Ursula von der Leyen and Michel issued a joint statement, pointing out the EU disagrees with the US’s unilateral application of travel ban, according to the Morning Daily of Singapore.
The epidemic is an international crisis, which needs cooperation rather than unilateral action, the statement said.
Facing such a severe epidemic, the US insists on imposing sanctions on some countries including Iran and Cuba, making them even harder to get medical materials, which are in a dire shortage.
US shifts blame on China
During China’s key period of fighting the epidemic, some US politicians repeated blaming China and made discriminatory comments.
President Trump said in a tweet that the US will strongly support sectors that were particularly affected by the “Chinese Virus” on March 16.
Before that, the US Secretary of States Mike Pompeo also called the novel coronavirus as “Wuhan Virus” in an interview.
Facing the novel coronavirus outbreak, the US’s blame game will do no good to the epidemic prevention and control in the US, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Gengshuang said.
China has made all-out efforts to prevent the spread of COVID-19, said Geng, adding that the US side should stop blaming China and correct the mistake of calling the novel coronavirus “Chinese Virus”, and try to make contributions to protecting the global public health security.
By:Jia Puyu
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