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the program. A White House official tells TIME that
one reason Trump was slow to react was that he was
influenced by “economic-focused guys,” like Kudlow
and Mnuchin. “They are so worried about markets,
understandably, they are worried about depressing
economic activity,” the official said. (Spokespeople
for Mnuchin and Kudlow denied either of them
stood in the way of a robust White House response.)
On March 16, Trump at last appeared to
understand the enormity of the danger facing the
American people. He embraced aggressive CDC
restrictions on public gatherings, urged national
sacrifice and struck a somber tone. Congress, which
only five weeks earlier had split along nearly partisan
lines to acquit Trump after his impeachment, began
sprinting to pass a handful of stimulus packages.
On March 18, it overwhelmingly passed a bill that
included paid sick leave, unemployment benefits
and free coronavirus testing for anyone who needs it.
These actions are positive steps, but even White
House officials privately admit they’re weeks late.
The virus has been rapidly spreading through
American communities since January. If we can’t
slow the infection rate now, our hospitals will be
overrun. Health care professionals will be forced
to triage patients and ration protective gear, and
doctors will have to make heartrending decisions,
as they have in Italy, on which patients receive
ventilators and which are left without adequate care.
Beyond the health crisis is an economic one.
Treasury Secretary Mnuchin warned GOP Senators
that unemployment in the U.S. could hit 20%
without the Administration’s massive stimulus
proposal. Even with it, few doubt that thousands
of businesses will close, millions of people will be
laid off, and millions more will go hungry. “One
thing is for sure,” says former CDC director Tom
Frieden. “It is going to get worse before it gets better.”
If Trump seems finally willing to take aggres-
sive measures to limit damage to the country, he re-
mains, as always, focused on his own image as well.
At a press conference on March 17, he claimed he
had foreseen the potential dangers of coronavirus
weeks ago. “I felt it was a pandemic long before it
was called a pandemic,” the President said.
At some point down the road, there will be
time to calculate the cost in U.S. lives and money
of Trump’s delayed response to the coronavirus.
For now, as the country braces itself for what lies
ahead, the American people can find solace in the
fact that even in the absence of national leadership,
they are rising to an extraordinary challenge of
confronting this disease together. —With reporting
by AlAnA AbrAmson, ChArlotte Alter, briAn
bennett, tessA berenson, VerA bergengruen,
Kimberly Dozier, PhiliP elliott, W.J. hennigAn,
lissAnDrA VillA and Justin WorlAnD/
WAshington □
AS ITALIAN HOSPITALS BUCKLED under an influx of
patients sick from the novel coronavirus, American
medical professionals and public officials looked on
with growing alarm. At the current infection rate, the
U.S. health care infrastructure could soon be overrun
too. “We are not ready,” says Dr. Irwin Redlener, director
of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at
Columbia University. “We are not ready virtually any-
where in the country for that kind of onslaught on our
health care system.”
Infections are already widespread in the U.S.
Unless the number of new cases is dramatically
reduced, U.S. hospitals could easily begin looking a lot
like Italy’s. If that happens, it would mean that doctors
would have to ration lifesaving care.
Dr. James Lawler, an infectious-diseases expert at
the University of Nebraska Medical Center, predicted
that in the next couple of months there could be as
many as 96 million cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. That
translates into roughly 1.9 million intensive-care-unit
admissions, 4.8 million hospitalizations and 480,000
deaths associated with the virus.
The U.S. has a fraction of the medical facilities,
equipment, supplies and staff needed to handle
that kind of surge. Redlener estimates there are just
95,000 intensive-care beds in the country. Perhaps
more worrisome, a 2010 survey estimated that the
U.S. had just 62,000 mechanical ventilators—
breathing-assistance machines required to treat
severe cases of COVID-19. Even including the ventila-
tors available from the federally managed Strategic
National Stockpile, which distributes supplies in a cri-
sis like this one, it’s a troublingly low number. (Health
and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said there
were “thousands and thousands” of ventilators in the
stockpile, but he did not give an exact number, citing
national-security concerns.)
Personal protective equipment, like gowns, N95
respirators, surgical masks, gloves and eye protection
are also in short supply. “If we don’t keep that curve
flat, and try to keep the critical cases down to a mini-
mum, we’re going to get to a point where we just don’t
have enough resources,” says Dr. John Hick, medical
director for emergency preparedness at Hennepin
Healthcare in Minneapolis.
Experts also foresee shortfalls in staffing. As
frontline health care workers contract the virus, or
simply become exhausted from endless hours of work,
finding enough doctors, nurses and other medical pro-
fessionals to care for a surge in patients may become
a formidable undertaking. “The biggest challenge is
personnel,” says Washington Governor Jay Inslee. “So
we’re bringing in retirees and people who are ready to
go, potentially from other states.” ÑLissandra Villa