[Genuine Realist]

Trump had a personal agenda in going along with Xi rather than listening to US and Tsiwan intelligence.

I've read that. But if anyone can articulate anything to be gained by deliberately underestimating the potential for pandemic, I have yet to read it.

If anything, raising the alarm would have helped him with the impeachment (remember that?) and undoubtedly would have been characterized as a  wag-the-dog tactic by the opposition.

Plus the underestimation of the potential seems to have been shared by everyone on both sides of the aisle, plus the major media. I've posted links on that, and won't post them again.

I appreciate that many would like to make political hay out of what happened in January, even when that requires embarrassing selective amnesia.  But it just ain't there.

The culprit here is the Communist Party of China, which to avoid institutional and national  embarrassment, deliberately understated the seriousness of the virus and its human-to-human transmission potential. The WHO did not declare this as a pandemic until January 30th - one day before a travel ban that (we now know) was already much, much too late.

[Genuine Realist]

Trump had a personal agenda in going along with Xi rather than listening to US and Tsiwan intelligence.

I've read that. But if anyone can articulate anything to be gained by deliberately underestimating the potential for pandemic, I have yet to read it.

If anything, raising the alarm would have helped him with the impeachment (remember that?) and undoubtedly would have been characterized as a  wag-the-dog tactic by the opposition.

Plus the underestimation of the potential seems to have been shared by everyone on both sides of the aisle, plus the major media. I've posted links on that, and won't post them again.

I appreciate that many would like to make political hay out of what happened in January, even when that requires embarrassing selective amnesia.  But it just ain't there.

The culprit here is the Communist Party of China, which to avoid institutional and national  embarrassment, deliberately understated the seriousness of the virus and its human-to-human transmission potential. The WHO did not declare this as a pandemic until January 30th - one day before a travel ban that (we now know) was already much, much too late.