A rising flood of COVID-19 patients and a shortage of ventilators are forcing physicians to choose which patients live and which die. Lack of critical medical supplies has New York City doctors operating under battlefield conditions. The nation is fighting a war against the disease state by state with a reality-star president providing little national coordination.
A March 28 email from the chief of NYU Langone Health Department emergency medicine advised doctors to “think more critically about who we intubate,” The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. Hospital leadership reassured doctors it would support life-and-death decisions they make during the pandemic:
“For those patients who you feel intubation will not change their ultimate clinical outcome (for example cardiac arrests, some chronic disease patients at end of life, etc) you will have support in your decision making at the department and institutional level to withhold futile intubations,” the email continued.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo Tuesday decried the lack of federal coordination. States are left to bid against each other, eBay-style, to obtain medical supplies on the open market, he said. Worse, they end up bidding against the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
Cuomo’s younger brother, Chris, a host for CNN, has been diagnosed with the illness.
“What sense does this make?” the exasperated governor asked reporters:
“The federal government, Fema, should have been the purchasing agent: buy everything and then allocate by need to the states. Why would you create a situation where the 50 states are competing with each other and then the federal government and Fema comes in and competes with the rest of it?”
Why? Because chaos is Donald Trump’s style, “a textbook case of how not to run a complex organization,” the New York Times declared less than two weeks into his term. Jeremy Konyndyk led the global fight against Ebola during the Obama administration. He told the Washington Post weeks ago, “To the extent that there’s someone to blame here, the blame is on poor, chaotic management from the White House and failure to acknowledge the big picture.”
The situation arises from having a posturing incompetent sitting in the White House talking about war and playing general. Did Franklin Roosevelt and the War Department leave army divisions to bid against each other for tanks, guns, and ammunition? In this “war,” Donald Trump has.
A president with no depth was out of his the moment he faithlessly took the oath of office. Now he faces hundreds of thousands dying on his watch. He lacks the skills to manage this crisis. Worse, he doesn’t know he lacks them. His principle concern now is not saving lives, but perception management.
“Anyone who says he now soberly accepts the realiity [sic] of the pandemic. No. He switched claims,” Jay Rosen tweets. “From we’re doing a fantastic job, the virus is like 15 people to we’re doing a fantastic job, if we did nothing it would be millions dead.”
The New York Times revealing the truth won’t stop the White House from lying:
WASHINGTON — White House economists published a study last September that warned a pandemic disease could kill a half million Americans and devastate the economy.
It went unheeded inside the administration.
Americans will die. Americans are dying. Trump will not lead, follow, or get out of the way. Those with the power to force him from office will not. They are complicit.
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For The Win, 3rd Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide election mechanics guide at ForTheWin.us. This is what winning looks like.
Note: The pandemic will upend standard field tactics in 2020. If enough promising “improvisations” come my way by June, perhaps I can issue a COVID-19 supplement.