[OutsiderFan]

Agree that feds could have set a national guideline and 'strongly encouraged' certain actions via the federal purse (how about no HHS $$ unless state has indoor mask-wearing mandate?).  Also agree that we have had no federal "plan of action" at all.  A multi-trillion dollar expenditure to . . . nowhere in particular.

What actions would those have been? Here's Dr Fauci's opinion in mid February: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/heal...787209002/

So, the long serving experts advising the government were dead wrong from the outset. As were the WHO and the CDC, and the predictors from Washington. . . . .

Reluctant to post a contrarian view, as I've been summarily banned from the Covid forum and can't post there, and therefore expect to be banned from here as well. Ironically, the mottos from my alma maters are "Truth" and "The Winds of Freedom Blow". . . . .

What's wrong about Fauci's February statement? Operating on what he knew at the time, he said there was nothing to worry about.  But he qualified that by saying if the spread is a lot more pervasive than we know, "we've got a problem."  The spread was in fact more pervasive than known because we didn't do any surveillance testing, arguably the greatest failure of this whole sorry episode.  That being said, I feel 100% confident that even if surveillance picked up more known cases, many government managers wouldn't have taken it seriously, wouldn't have got behind strong NPIs, and we still would have ended up with a disaster.

[OutsiderFan]

Agree that feds could have set a national guideline and 'strongly encouraged' certain actions via the federal purse (how about no HHS $$ unless state has indoor mask-wearing mandate?).  Also agree that we have had no federal "plan of action" at all.  A multi-trillion dollar expenditure to . . . nowhere in particular.

What actions would those have been? Here's Dr Fauci's opinion in mid February: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/heal...787209002/

So, the long serving experts advising the government were dead wrong from the outset. As were the WHO and the CDC, and the predictors from Washington. . . . .

Reluctant to post a contrarian view, as I've been summarily banned from the Covid forum and can't post there, and therefore expect to be banned from here as well. Ironically, the mottos from my alma maters are "Truth" and "The Winds of Freedom Blow". . . . .

What's wrong about Fauci's February statement? Operating on what he knew at the time, he said there was nothing to worry about.  But he qualified that by saying if the spread is a lot more pervasive than we know, "we've got a problem."  The spread was in fact more pervasive than known because we didn't do any surveillance testing, arguably the greatest failure of this whole sorry episode.  That being said, I feel 100% confident that even if surveillance picked up more known cases, many government managers wouldn't have taken it seriously, wouldn't have got behind strong NPIs, and we still would have ended up with a disaster.