Here we are, on the eve of an election, with almost a quarter-million Americans dead from COVID-19. Many of these deaths were avoidable. These individual tragedies, coupled with the loss of jobs and in-person school, add up to a generational national trauma. This human toll is the price we are paying for our national polarization. Given the staggering cost, we should be clear-eyed about the bitter fight in which we are engaged.
First, let me state plainly that I agree with those who think that the Trump administration has failed abysmally to meet the overriding challenge of our day: to deliver the public health response to the coronavirus pandemic that would be the necessary foundation for a resilient economy and society. Yet he is not to blame alone. Our problems run much deeper.
Public health experts, economists, ethicists, state and municipal leaders, and even federal legislators from both parties have been in broad agreement since June about the response the country needs: substantial investment in public health infrastructure for testing, contact tracing and supported isolation; consistent public communications about risk-mitigation strategies such as mask-wearing; and rapid development of therapeutics and vaccines. The United States Conference of Mayors, for instance, endorsed just such a policy framework, as put forward by my research team at Harvard’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics. The House Democrats’ Heroes Actincluded a version of such a framework in the testing and tracing section of the bill. The bipartisan Cassidy-Smith and Craig-Roe Suppress COVID-19 Acts, in the Senate and House respectively, also shared this framework.
Please select this link to read the complete article from The Washington Post.