I was sitting here thinking about what should be happening right now that isn’t, given the problem of shortages of hospital beds. This isn’t the type of thing that could be done quietly, so I assume it’s not being done. But if I were POTUS, I’d have been ordering DOD (because I assume they can build it the fastest) to build makeshift hospitals in warm weather areas (worth a shot), where we can give people beds and oxygen. This should have already been started. We’ll be above capacity in numerous cities and it’s unfair to ask other cities to sacrifice the lives of their future sick to care for the sick of other cities for the entire 3-6 weeks. We need the federal government to be able to say, “You’ve got a few weeks before it’s bad here, give us 2-3 weeks and then offload them to us. This is not really a request, but regardless, your country thanks you.”
We should have been “asking” any company that can mass-produce oxygen tanks and other relevant equipment domestically to do so and to scale up to their maximum output. As POTUS, I’d be telling them they’re going to max out, they’re not going to raise prices one penny, they’re not going to export one unit until we have enough for our projected needs, and they’re not going to get a tax handout either. They’re going to get the thanks of the grateful nation and some great publicity afterwards, and if they do the right thing without complaining and go above and beyond, maybe a presidential medal… But if they start complaining or refusing, they’re going to get the bully pulpit smashed over their head in such public and epic fashion that nobody in this country will ever want to buy one widget from them ever again.
We should be training soldiers/national guard to help staff and monitor these hospitals - we won’t have enough doctors and nurses, so we need to offload the menial labor on others who can then pass info to doctors/nurses to get stuff done efficiently. We should be screening these forces already to determine who can do this without being at high risk - so under 40, no lung or immune conditions, etc.
We should be planning how to transport people, and how to manage regional crises.
I’m sure some of this is being done, but there’s no indication there’s been any abnormal efforts to scale up production of medical equipment and protective equipment beyond free market forces (you better believe we’d hear about it) and there’s nothing being built (we’d obviously hear about that too).
Instead we get (paraphrasing), “This will be totally fine it’s like the flu the numbers are very low folks and my approval rating is very high.”
This is one of those times where it shouldn’t really matter whether the president is a Democrat or a Republican, not to any large degree. It matters whether they’re competent or incompetent. I’d snap put Romney or Kasich in charge of this and feel like they’d do a decent job, even if I’d rather have Obama.
Just give me someone who understands the resources at their disposal, believes scientists and doctors, and gives a flying fuck. Give me someone who won’t play politics for at least a couple months because lives are at stake. That’s legit all we need, but we really needed them a month ago, so we’re basically on our own now. They’ll probably start building some of this stuff once it’s too late, and finish right after the outbreaks end.