PRESIDENT SHOULD STOP DOWNPLAYING THE VIRUS AND PUSHING UNPROVEN DRUGS

…Daily Coronavirus TV Updates, that replace many daily news programs

President Trump continues to appear to be unable to tell the truth

According to our president, his administration has done everything it should have done for the coronavirus pandemic, and they did it as soon as it became a serious problem.

That’s pure B.S.

I have already published the truth that the president waited 70 days and he downplayed the coronavirus 33 times before he had decided that perhaps it wouldn’t “go away miraculously”.

The truth is that all the bad stuff happening today, including the states' lock-downs, job layoffs and the daily death tolls, these could last for a long while. Yes, for months, maybe even a year..

If only the president would stop lying.  All Americans need to be better prepared, because better-managed expectations will produce better outcomes.

It is time to send the president to his room, and to hear from honest, data-driven professionals inside and outside the US government.  Already, outside experts suggest that the current crises is expected to be deep and prolonged.

Even the president’s White House coronavirus task force’s questionable model, it projects that, even with maximum social distancing measures, US deaths will continue at least through June.  In addition, President Trump’s former Food and Drug Administration commissioner, among other public health experts, also expects a renewed outbreak of the virus in the fall.

Even though the economic forecasts are all over the map, most analysts appear to expect double-digit negative hits this quarter.  Unemployment over the same period could easily range from 10.5% to 40.6%, and this is according to the economists at the Federal Reserve Bank. For context, unemployment during the Great Recession of 2008 peaked at 10%.

It’s time for the American people to hear the truth.  But this president appears incapable of doing that.

The president keeps saying that once the virus deaths finally end, the nation’s economy will: “Come back even stronger than before the pandemic!”  His actual words.

Over the past two months, President Trump has regularly downplayed the Covid-19 threat with his personal mix of non-facts and false statements.

But there is no justification for most of his statements.  In fact, last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said it assumes unemployment will be 9% after the pandemic and at the end of 2021. That’s more than a year from now and it could be much worse.  In other words, no matter how much the president wills it, a swift economic bounce-back probably won’t happen..

You’d never think this from the way Trump or his senior aides have repeatedly played down the public health issues and the nation’s economic risks.

If you recall, the Trump administration Initially proclaimed the virus was “contained” and they said the early count of 15 cases “within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”  However, as of this week, there were more than 350,000 confirmed US cases. Trump has said a “vaccine was imminent”, while all the experts say that it’s, “likely at least a year away”.  Trump also said the economy would be “opened up by Easter”, not even close……and so on, and so on.

Even with all the bad news at his so called “updates” every day, he still says : That his “crowded public events will be back sooner rather than later.”

(BTW: It interesting that the president’s daily Coronavirus Updates, they just happen to occur at the same time that the daily news usually occurs in the East and Midwest.  So, those stations with the “real news” are unable to get to their normal audience while the president is doing a daily campaign rally for his administration.)

When the president was asked this week if there was a contingency plan for the Republican National Convention scheduled for August, he responded with: “We have no contingency plan.”

This should be the slogan for Trump's entire presidency.

The president has done a great job of accusing the real media of being alarmists or even ghouls for cheering on the catastrophe. This is flatly wrong.  The sick and dying Americans are those among the media’s loved ones, their good friends, colleagues and neighbors.  They are also the ones losing their jobs.  The media will all be extraordinarily relieved if the current projections turn out to have been pessimistic.

Unfortunately, unlike the president, we can’t get what we want by wishing away the risk, or by enabling a Trump administration that repeatedly over-promises and under-delivers.

Improper expectations will lead to a greater spread of the Virus.  If the US government tells people that the stay-at-home measures will be lifted by Easter, and then they’re not, the compliance will be worse than if the government had given it an extended time frame.

Better-managed expectations will result in more compliance, it always does.

It is always hard to find a middle ground between frightening the people and offering false hope.  Public officials today should instead start by offering greater transparency about what they know, what they expect, and the possible range of outcomes.

The White House’s public health experts such as Dr. Fauci and some governors, such as New York’s Andrew Cuomo (D), have mostly been doing this.

The president should stop with the deadlines for when the economy will “re-open” or making predictions about unproven treatments.

They need to start developing and actually communicating real and honest contingency plans…..now!

But with this president, don't bet on it.

Copyright G. Ater 2020