U.S. TO STAY OPEN EVEN IF 2ND WAVE OF COVID-19 HITS

The U.S. will stay open and will not impose any kind of lockdown should a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic zaps the country, U.S. President Donald Trump declared during a tour of a Ford Motor factory in Michigan on Thursday, May 22, 2020 (Friday in Manila.) “We are going to put out the fires. We’re not going to close the country,” Trump explained. “We can put out the fires. Whether it is an ember or a flame, we are going to put it out. But we are not closing our country.”

Chris Walker said in his story for Truthout on May 23, 2020 that top U.S. epidemiologist Dr. Anthony Fauci had already revealed in an interview with The Washington Post that resurgence is inevitable. “The virus is not going to disappear. It’s a highly transmissible virus,” Fauci said. “At any given time, it’s some place or another. As long as that’s the case, there’s a risk of resurgence.” Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did not rule out the possibility of implementing shelter-in-place rules if and when a second wave came about.

Walker said Megan Ranney, an emergency physician and a researcher at Brown University, told members of Congress this week that the U.S. is not ready for another spike of COVID-19 cases. “I do not think that we are currently prepared for a second wave,” she said and explained that there is not enough financial support to combat the pandemic. “We still lack adequate science. I’m so thankful for the funding that you all have given to the [National Institutes of Health] and CDC, but that’s not enough, and we need more,” she added. Most Americans seem to share her concerns.

According to an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll published this week, 77 percent of American adults say that they worry about a second wave of coronavirus happening as more businesses across the country reopen. Less than a quarter of the American populace said they weren’t that concerned about it. This makes Trump’s position untenable to the majority of Americans. #COVID19