Major FAIL

[A]n administration that has lagged behind at nearly every step of the pandemic still has no consensus plan for when or how to reopen parts of the economy, even as the president and many advisers push to do so as soon as May 1. There is still no concerted plan for getting vital medical supplies to states, which are left to fight among themselves or seek favors from Trump. There is also no developed plan for what happens if cases or deaths spike as people begin to return to work, or how to respond if the coronavirus surges again in the fall, as many public health experts and administration officials fear.

Public health experts say that among the keys to returning to normalcy are nationwide virus testing (to determine who has the virus); serological testing (to allow those who have been exposed to the virus and developed immunity to return to work); and contact tracing (quickly tracking all the contacts of an infected person, to halt further spread).

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But the administration has not fully grappled with the sheer manpower and resources required for an effort like contact tracing — and right now, there are not even enough coronavirus tests for those who need them, let alone the entire country.

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"There isn’t any clear direction as to what the strategic goals are in each different line of effort, and what the prospective timeline could be given the assets they have to deploy.”

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Advisers spend significant time trying to manage the president and his whims — from successfully dissuading him from seeking to reopen the country at Easter to tempering his impulse to push unproven drugs as miracle elixirs.

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Basic hospital supplies are still so lagging that on Thursday, Pence suggested that medical professionals “recycle gowns.”

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“Everything they’re doing is responding to something that’s already happened,” said [a former senior administration] official, who stays in touch with administration officials. “Coordination from this White House has never been a particular strong suit.”

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The Situation Room seating chart — sent out every morning by Short in a PowerPoint — has become one of the task force’s hottest documents.

Aides parse the power map for signs of who is up, who is down and who is likely to speak during the news conference that evening, with those closest to Pence having the best odds. Birx is almost always on Pence’s right while other, less senior aides are along the back wall or in an overflow room.

One senior administration official described it as a “little reality show drama. Every day we wait for the email. It’s like ‘Game of Thrones.’ ”

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The vice president leads the meeting, which often begins with a prayer.

  WaPo

Jesus Christ.

Despite the debates, few actual decisions are made. Instead, Pence tries to reach a consensus and then bring it to the president for approval. Decisions made in the room are often undermined by Trump, and some discussions, such as guidance on wearing masks, stretched on for weeks.

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Trump shows up to task force meetings infrequently, but when he does, he is a lively presence who often makes the gatherings more lighthearted, aides said. In one meeting, Trump suggested that he present the good news and Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, give the bad news — a good-cop-bad-cop addition to the evening briefing.

And that's pretty much how they actually do it.

The first Sunday in April, Trump entered the Situation Room and startled everyone by announcing that he wanted to do a news conference in the next two hours. He asked members of the group — many of whom had called in or were dressed casually — what they thought of the idea. When he was met with silence, he forged ahead — and aides scrambled to assemble the media.

During one task force meeting in the Situation Room last month, Trump turned to Fauci and challenged him.

It was the day the administration was adding Ireland and the United Kingdom to its travel restrictions, and Trump wanted to understand why talk of “herd immunity” — allowing the coronavirus to sweep a nation largely unchecked, with the belief that those who survived would then be immune — was such a bad idea.

“Why don’t we let this wash over the country?” Trump asked.

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Fauci initially seemed confused by the term “wash over” but became alarmed once he understood what Trump was asking.

“Mr. President, many people would die,” Fauci said.

He'd be okay with that.

The president said he understood but since then has repeatedly made clear he wants to reopen things soon — although significant roadblocks remain.

The "but" in that sentence should be "and".

Outside advisers to the task force and experts have also warned that if a drug to treat the coronavirus is not available by the fall, the country will have little to defend itself against another catastrophic wave of infections and will not be able to keep the economy up and running. But there is no clear plan or guidance from the administration on how to be ready for such a challenge.

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One Trump adviser said the CDC has not provided local officials with enough data about what is happening nationwide. The agency has not released a snapshot of what it thinks is happening nationally, to the dismay of doctors, who now call each other or look for advice on Twitter.

Jesus Christ.

Shortly before the official task force meeting nearly every day, six doctors hold their own meeting, sometimes reconvening afterward.

They grapple with the complex public health and medical questions over how to safely reopen the country, and they are crafting a plan to run past additional health experts once complete.

The group is led by [Deborah] Birx — who asked Pence for permission before forming it several weeks ago — and includes Fauci, Giroir, Surgeon General Jerome Adams, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn and CDC Director Robert Redfield.

It sprang up after some of the doctors grew frustrated with the “voodoo” included in the larger meetings, such as Trump’s hydroxychloroquine push.

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The FDA hopes to approve a serology test in the coming weeks that could be used widely — but not everyone will be able to be tested right away. So far, officials have tentatively agreed that health-care workers, food workers and front-line responders should be given priority for serological tests because they are most at risk of having been exposed to the virus. As fall approaches, students and teachers will also be a priority, one official said.

But as of now, nearly three months since the first coronavirus case was reported in the United States, no plan is set.

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On Friday, Fauci expressed caution in an interview on CNN about reopening the country too soon: “I would want to see a clear indication that you are very, very clearly and strongly going in the right direction, because the one thing you don’t want to do is, you don’t want to get out there prematurely and then wind up back in the same situation,” he said.

Hours later, Trump similarly teased his upcoming choice, trying to summon the gravity of the moment.

“I have a big decision coming up and I only hope to God that it’s the right decision,” the president said.

Jesus wept.