What the hell is wrong with the CDC right now ?
[s]It just seems to be ran like a startup or something. Jesus.[/s]
How can more people not be outraged by the govmnt lack of readiness?
[s]It just seems to be ran like a startup or something. Jesus.[/s]
How can more people not be outraged by the govmnt lack of readiness?
> In May 2018, Trump ordered the NSC’s entire global health security unit shut down, calling for reassignment of Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer and dissolution of his team inside the agency. The month before, then-White House National Security Advisor John Bolton pressured Ziemer’s DHS counterpart, Tom Bossert, to resign along with his team. Neither the NSC nor DHS epidemic teams have been replaced. The global health section of the CDC was so drastically cut in 2018 that much of its staff was laid off and the number of countries it was working in was reduced from 49 to merely 10. Meanwhile, throughout 2018, the U.S. Agency for International Development and its director, Mark Green, came repeatedly under fire from both the White House and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. And though Congress has so far managed to block Trump administration plans to cut the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps by 40 percent, the disease-fighting cadres have steadily eroded as retiring officers go unreplaced.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/31/coronavirus-china-trump...
It really is crazy for a US government agency to be supporting 49 countries. I hope this isn't typical. Imagine all the other agencies doing likewise. The EPA can stop pollution in France, Botswana, Finland, and 45 other countries. The Department of Education can regulate schools in Russia, Spain, Argentina, and 45 other countries.
That's just messed up. It's treating them as colonies.
"CDC works 24/7 to protect America from health, safety and security threats, both foreign and in the U.S. Whether diseases start at home or abroad, are chronic or acute, curable or preventable, human error or deliberate attack, CDC fights disease and supports communities and citizens to do the same."
https://www.cdc.gov/about/organization/mission.htm
It isn't about fixing every problem abroad, or regulating any foreign nation's health agencies. It's about controlling/recognizing threats that start abroad before they spread to the US.
For example, maybe Poland could fund a disease-control effort in 49 different countries, including the USA.
The USA could expect about 48 countries to do likewise. We could have our diseases controlled by Slovakia, Ireland, Haiti, Singapore, South Sudan, Denmark, Laos, Pakistan, Chile, Peru, Ghana, Estonia, and dozens more.
I suspect other nations do the same. It would be daft to ignore epidemics abroad.
> In 2018, the Trump administration fired the government’s entire pandemic response chain of command, including the White House management infrastructure. https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/31/coronavirus-china-trump...
CDC to cut by 80 percent efforts to prevent global disease outbreak (2018): https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/0...
They are not the same issue. Taken from the FP article linked above:
>In the spring of 2018, the White House pushed Congress to cut funding for Obama-era disease security programs, proposing to eliminate $252 million in previously committed resources for rebuilding health systems in Ebola-ravaged Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. Under fire from both sides of the aisle, President Donald Trump dropped the proposal to eliminate Ebola funds a month later. But other White House efforts included reducing $15 billion in national health spending and cutting the global disease-fighting operational budgets of the CDC, NSC, DHS, and HHS. And the government’s $30 million Complex Crises Fund was eliminated.
>In May 2018, Trump ordered the NSC’s entire global health security unit shut down, calling for reassignment of Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer and dissolution of his team inside the agency. The month before, then-White House National Security Advisor John Bolton pressured Ziemer’s DHS counterpart, Tom Bossert, to resign along with his team. Neither the NSC nor DHS epidemic teams have been replaced. The global health section of the CDC was so drastically cut in 2018 that much of its staff was laid off and the number of countries it was working in was reduced from 49 to merely 10. Meanwhile, throughout 2018, the U.S. Agency for International Development and its director, Mark Green, came repeatedly under fire from both the White House and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. And though Congress has so far managed to block Trump administration plans to cut the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps by 40 percent, the disease-fighting cadres have steadily eroded as retiring officers go unreplaced.
In 2018, 80% of the staff working at the CDC global health section were let go because of Trump budget cuts.
From an on-the-ground perspective, most of the infrastructure is intact and the day-to-day works of the CDC is running as normal.
However, it seems like the top few officials have constantly been rotated, including now Mike Pence is in charge, meaning the ability to lead and organize mass response at a Federal level is handicapped.