The administrations covid19 testing fuck up.

[spin_dry]

only the best people...
 

 

Azar in the crosshairs for delays in virus tests

03/02/2020 01:04 PM EST

Even as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention takes blame for testing delays that may have led to hundreds of Americans being infected with the coronavirus, officials inside the health agency and the White House are increasingly pointing the finger at one leader: Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, who they say failed to coordinate the response, as agency chiefs waited for instructions that came too late and other deputies were largely cut out of the process.

Numerous problems with the Trump administration’s testing regimen have come to light: Coronavirus tests developed by CDC were flawed, possibly because the lab itself was contaminated. The resulting lack of test capacity forced U.S. officials to screen a limited number of patients in January and February, with the CDC testing fewer than 500 Americans at the same time that China was likely testing at least 1 million of its own residents. Meanwhile, public health officials had no fallback testing option until the Food and Drug Administration granted approval for hospitals and other labs to develop their own homegrown tests on Saturday — more than six weeks after the first U.S. case of coronavirus was identified.

Advertisement

Public health officials acknowledge that CDC and other parts of the government have repeatedly stumbled in the early days of the outbreak but say that the 52-year-old Azar, a former drug company executive who took over the department in 2018, did not reach out early or often enough to goad his subordinates into action.

“The administration’s response has been reactive, not proactive."

A former HHS official

“This was a management failure,” said one administration official, charging that Azar didn’t adequately plan for a worst-case coronavirus scenario that’s grown more likely by the day — even though Azar touted his bona fides as a veteran of the George W. Bush administration, where he helped fight crises like SARS and an anthrax scare. "CDC and FDA should have been working hand in hand to get Plan B, Plan C and Plan D ready to go," the official said.

“The administration’s response has been reactive, not proactive,” added a former HHS official. “A lot of what has happened has been driven by outside pressure,” like public health labs sounding the alarm that they were unable to perform the CDC’s tests.

Azar was abruptly removed as leader of the U.S. government’s coronavirus response Wednesday night and replaced by Vice President Mike Pence. Though the health secretary is still technically chairing the coronavirus task force, decision-making, media requests and even task force membership have increasingly been run through the White House. Since Azar's removal as coronavirus response leader, several of his deputies and rivals have been added to the task force.

Advertisement

POLITICO spoke to 17 current and former officials and individuals close to the Trump administration. Interviews with officials in HHS, who declined to comment on record for fear of retaliation, indicated that Azar’s failure to reach out to a wider circle of advisers is typical of his management style, which has grown increasingly distrustful of his own aides.

The surgeon general is supposed to be the nation’s chief spokesperson on threats to public health, but Surgeon General Jerome Adams had been little seen or heard from during the coronavirus threat until Azar was removed from leading the effort last week. Pence immediately added Adams to the task force, and the surgeon general this weekend began issuing coronavirus guidance on social media and appearing on national TV programs.

The FDA oversees drug and lab test development, but Commissioner Stephen Hahn also wasn’t included on the Azar-led task force and has been frequently sidelined during the crisis. Hahn's most notable public moment was being summoned out of the crowd by Pence on Saturday to answer a question directed to President Donald Trump during a White House news conference.

Pence also added Hahn to the coronavirus task force after growing upset during a recent meeting that nobody could adequately answer a question about threats to the nation’s drug supply, two people with knowledge of the situation said.

Advertisement

While Hahn’s agency on Saturday did roll out instructions to let certain health organizations develop their own coronavirus lab tests, “FDA has been trying for some time to issue that guidance,” said one official, who added that the agency was waiting on approval from HHS and Azar. Another official said Hahn had begun devising the strategy weeks ago.

An HHS spokesperson defended Azar's leadership and the administration's broader strategy of trying to contain the virus from January through February, arguing that it bought valuable time to prepare the nation for an outbreak.

"HHS has been working with public health systems since Day One — that’s how we’ve been catching these cases and educating the American public on what to do if they become symptomatic," the spokesperson said. "The task force has held countless briefings with members of Congress and state and local leaders, so they can appropriately prepare and educate their constituencies."

Asked whether Azar was responsible for the CDC's testing failures, the spokesperson took issue with the framing. "Because of CDC surge capacity, there has been no backlog of tests despite the diagnostic issue," the spokesperson said, referencing problems that prevented many tests from working. "It’s unfair to say testing has been limited."

Public health groups have argued there was no testing backlog because CDC capacity problems forced HHS to limit testing to Americans who were returning from China or people close to a confirmed case, rather than expanding the testing more widely — and picking up potential cases of the virus spreading in the community.

 

The HHS spokesperson also defended Adams' and Hahn's involvement in coronavirus planning, saying that the two officials have been part of coronavirus meetings for weeks. A senior administration official said Hahn particularly has been involved in White House planning.

Senior officials contend that Azar is operating under fear of offending Trump or his allies, which has led him to keep Adams, Hahn and his other underlings on a tight leash, while jockeying for credit to stay in the president’s good graces. Azar’s widely publicized feud last fall with Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Administrator Seema Verma, which contributed to the department’s failure to come up with an alternative to Obamacare and necessitated a series of emergency White House meetings, highlighted some of these tendencies, the officials said.

Azar and his top aides also have for months frozen out Adams, who is close to Verma, and at times openly questioned Adams’ ability to handle basic duties and stay on message. Adams played down coronavirus fears in a Monday interviewon "Fox and Friends," predicting that more people globally would die from the flu.

Advertisement

Azar's supporters dispute that he has undermined Adams. An individual familiar with Azar's thinking said the HHS secretary has a good working dynamic with the surgeon general and the two men recently had lunch together. Azar has been "very impressed" with Adams' recent television appearances and hopes to have him play a larger role on coronavirus messaging, the individual said.

POLITICO on Monday morning reported that Verma was being added to the task force. The individual familiar with Azar's thinking said the health secretary supports her addition to the group and also pushed for bringing Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie on board, arguing that the officials will be important inclusions as coronavirus becomes more of a domestic issue that poses a risk to health systems, the individual said.

Meanwhile, criticism for the stalled coronavirus tests has mounted on CDC and its director, Robert Redfield, amid that agency’s high-profile stumbles in recent weeks. CDC supported quarantining hundreds of Americansaboard a cruise ship, which backfired as coronavirus rapidly spread on board, and Redfield also took blame for wrongly briefing Trump and Pence on Saturday, leading Trump to misidentify the first U.S. coronavirus death, a man in his 50s, as a “wonderful woman.”

Medicare chief Seema Verma.

But two individuals said Redfield was wrongly being set up by some HHS officials as the fall guy for the administration’s biggest coronavirus misstep — the lab-testing failure — arguing that the CDC chief had worked to speed the tests while advocating for a fallback lab-testing option but was waiting on Azar’s permission to move forward on Plan B. “He’s great on this,” said one senior administration official, adding that Redfield is “busting his ass with a very hard job [and] working harder than any other senior official at HHS.”

An HHS spokesperson said that CDC was taking steps to improve testing. "CDC and FDA have been working together to correct the issue with the diagnostic in a timely manner and worked together to make alternatives more readily available that meet the appropriate accuracy standards for testing," the spokesperson said.

The health department's slow response also has set off finger-pointing among top officials and Azar's deputies, reigniting longstanding feuds at a crucial time when the Trump administration needs to work in lockstep. Officials at CDC and Robert Kadlec, the HHS assistant secretary for preparedness and response, have jockeyed over coronavirus quarantine rules and evacuating at-risk Americans, the latest skirmish between two agencies that have spent years battling over which gets to be in charge of the nation's emergency medical stockpile.

White House officials also have clashed with Azar and accused him of giving overly optimistic guidance to Trump, a battle that dates back a year and has encompassed numerous policies. Meanwhile, an HHS whistleblower and an FDA scientist have stepped forward to warn that the department's coronavirus response has been disorganized and could put Americans at risk. Azar has said he supports whistleblowers and vowed full investigations.

The disjointed, at times chaotic coronavirus response has alarmed allies of the HHS secretary, who worry Azar will ultimately shoulder much of the blame within the administration and from the public for failing to contain the outbreak.

Advertisement

The public health crisis threatens to become the defining episode of Azar’s tenure, people close to him lamented in recent days, overshadowing more than two years of work on various policy initiatives and linking his legacy as health secretary to the administration’s struggles to combat a fast-spreading virus that could linger for months — potentially infecting thousands, disrupting Americans’ daily lives and grinding to a halt the once-strong economy that Trump officials view as key to the president’s reelection.

“Right now, there's probably hundreds or low thousands of cases … that aren’t reported yet,” Trump’s former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said on “Face the Nation” Sunday, referencing a new estimate of spreading coronavirus in Washington state. “One of the mistakes, one of the challenges was getting the diagnostic testing in place.”

Having failed to track and quash isolated cases, it may be too late to now guard against a widespread outbreak of coronavirus in the United States. Health officials have increasingly shifted their mindset from “containment” — stopping the virus altogether — to “mitigation,” or preventing the virus’ worst effects on Americans. Chris Meekins, a former Trumpossip administration HHS emergency-preparedness official, on Sunday said the risk of significant U.S. outbreaks had risen from 33 percent to 75 percent in the last week alone.

POLITICO Pulse

Get the latest on the health care fight, every weekday morning — in your inbox.

Azar’s job is not believed to be in imminent jeopardy, people close to the White House said, in part because firing the nation’s top health official in the midst of an outbreak would prompt further questions about the administration’s response effort.

But Azar — who already has few friends within the White House, which weighed a list of potential replacements in December — has been further weakened internally by his brief period leading Trump’s coronavirus task force, during which he battled repeatedly with national security staffers over strategy and frustrated White House officials who at times questioned whether he was withholding information.

Meanwhile, Azar’s attempts to publicly play down the risks of the virus — saying for weeks that there were just more than a dozen U.S. cases — were criticized by some officials as too optimistic at the time and, in retrospect, seen as incautious. The HHS secretary repeated the message across four congressional hearings last week and national TV briefings, even as it turned out the virus was silently spreading in the United States.

“Focusing on just 15 cases was a tragic health care disservice,” said a former HHS official. “Hospitals and health providers needed to know about the risks and get ready to take more steps.”

Sarah Karlin-Smith contributed to this report.

[Mainecat]

The Space Force can handle this.

[racer254]

Article from March 2nd?  WTF.

[Jimmy Snacks]

Oh but you can't point fingers at Trump and his people for fucking this up....blame Impeachment, Schumer, Pelosi, Obama...etc.....anything or anybody but Trump.

[spin_dry]

Just now, racer254 said:

Article from March 2nd?  WTF.

By that time the US had the virus genome for over 6 weeks. Given to them by China. No test. 

[Jimmy Snacks]

2 minutes ago, racer254 said:

Article from March 2nd?  WTF.

[spin_dry]

2 minutes ago, Jimmy Snacks said:

Oh but you can't point fingers at Trump and his people for fucking this up....blame Impeachment, Schumer, Pelosi, Obama...etc.....anything or anybody but Trump.

When you elect a president that can’t walk and comb his ego at the same time, this shit happens. 

Edited April 2, 2020 by spin_dry

[Jimmy Snacks]

Just now, spin_dry said:

When you elect a president that walk and comb his ego at the same time, this shit happens. 

Good point. 

[snoughnut]

1 minute ago, Jimmy Snacks said:

Oh but you can't point fingers at Trump and his people for fucking this up....blame Impeachment, Schumer, Pelosi, Obama...etc.....anything or anybody but Trump.

Give it a rest already. The bottom line is you can bet your ass that even if the Trump admin. was handling the situation with perfection, the liberal twats would find something to bitch about, it's in their nature.

[Jimmy Snacks]

1 minute ago, snoughnut said:

Give it a rest already. The bottom line is you can bet your ass that even if the Trump admin. was handling the situation with perfection, the liberal twats would find something to bitch about, it's in their nature.

Yeah you fucktards keep saying that but guess what...he fucked it up good and we are all suffering  for it so GFY. 

 

Edited April 2, 2020 by Jimmy Snacks

[spin_dry]

4 minutes ago, snoughnut said:

Give it a rest already. The bottom line is you can bet your ass that even if the Trump admin. was handling the situation with perfection, the liberal twats would find something to bitch about, it's in their nature.

Raises my hand. Yes for me!!!

[snoughnut]

7 minutes ago, Jimmy Snacks said:

Yeah you fucktards keep saying that but guess what...he fucked it up good and we are all suffering  for it so GFY. 

 

Yeah right, I'm sure you're suffering, I'll bet you haven't missed a meal since the pandemic started. Poor Jimmy.

[Zambroski]

6 minutes ago, snoughnut said:

Yeah right, I'm sure you're suffering, I'll bet you haven't missed a meal since the pandemic started. Poor Jimmy.

I know I haven’t.  God damn I’m putting on some LB’s!!!!!!  “The COVID 15”.

 

[Ez ryder]

55 minutes ago, spin_dry said:

When you elect a president that can’t walk and comb his ego at the same time, this shit happens. 

no not true 

at the time this shit was going down you and your party's biggest concern was waiting time with a dog and pony show they could not win but had to keep the base happy

during that time Tom cotton came to trump to talk about what he gas seen in China trump took 3 hrs off from your little trial to talk with Tom and his advisors about tghis 

after this trump haunted non esental travel from China to the dismay of a lot of his advisors .

the next day old Chuck took the stage again at the dog and pony show to call the move racist .

then Tom went to talk with the CDC who's fucking job it is to be ahead of this sort of shit .

why are there 10900 full time CDC workers who avarage between 94k and 129k a yr if they cant do there fucking job . it is not not nor should it be the presidents job to tell the CDC a killer fast spreding virus is in china .

the CDC being a totally big govenment entrenched agency of course said to them self oh yes,we are the only ones cappable of making this test . you know the hundereds of other labs in the countery could never do the govenments work . so yeah here we are . another big govenment burocrisy screws the pooch on the 1 thing they are suppose to be on top of .

time to reviset the whole fucking CDC 

the surgeon General office 

and the HHS 

if not 1 of them saw this coming and planned accordingly 

far as I can tell Tom Cotton was the only fucking one on the ball and this is not his fucking job 

[spin_dry]

19 minutes ago, Ez ryder said:

no not true 

at the time this shit was going down you and your party's biggest concern was waiting time with a dog and pony show they could not win but had to keep the base happy

during that time Tom cotton came to trump to talk about what he gas seen in China trump took 3 hrs off from your little trial to talk with Tom and his advisors about tghis 

after this trump haunted non esental travel from China to the dismay of a lot of his advisors .

the next day old Chuck took the stage again at the dog and pony show to call the move racist .

then Tom went to talk with the CDC who's fucking job it is to be ahead of this sort of shit .

why are there 10900 full time CDC workers who avarage between 94k and 129k a yr if they cant do there fucking job . it is not not nor should it be the presidents job to tell the CDC a killer fast spreding virus is in china .

the CDC being a totally big govenment entrenched agency of course said to them self oh yes,we are the only ones cappable of making this test . you know the hundereds of other labs in the countery could never do the govenments work . so yeah here we are . another big govenment burocrisy screws the pooch on the 1 thing they are suppose to be on top of .

time to reviset the whole fucking CDC 

the surgeon General office 

and the HHS 

if not 1 of them saw this coming and planned accordingly 

far as I can tell Tom Cotton was the only fucking one on the ball and this is not his fucking job 

Trump put bad people in charge. 

[Jimmy Snacks]

1 minute ago, spin_dry said:

Trump put bad people in charge. 

Simple as that

[Ez ryder]

11 minutes ago, spin_dry said:

Trump put bad people in charge. 

wrong 

the whole fucking system is broken the samecsstem you want to run your healthcare .

and again let's not forget what your whole life every dick in DC  and every reporter in the countery was revolving around at this time 

 

here is your unqualified 

Robert R. Redfield, MD

Robert R. Redfield, MD, is the 18th Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. He has been a public health leader actively engaged in clinical research and clinical care of chronic human viral infections and infectious diseases, especially HIV, for more than 30 years.

He served as the founding director of the Department of Retroviral Research within the U.S. Military’s HIV Research Program, and retired after 20 years of service in the U.S. Army Medical Corps. Following his 

military service, he co-founded the University of Maryland’s Institute of Human Virology with Dr. William Blattner and Dr. Robert C. Gallo and served as the Chief of Infectious Diseases and Vice Chair of Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

Dr. Redfield made several important early contributions to the scientific understanding of HIV, including the demonstration of the importance of heterosexual transmission, the development of the Walter Reed staging system for HIV infection, and the demonstration of active HIV replication in all stages of HIV infection.

In addition to his research work, Dr. Redfield oversaw an extensive clinical program providing HIV care and treatment to more than 5,000 patients in the Baltimore/Washington, D.C. community.

Dr. Redfield served as a member of the President’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS from 2005 to 2009, and was appointed as Chair of the International Subcommittee from 2006 to 2009.

He is a past member of the Office of AIDS Research Advisory Council at the National Institutes of Health, the Fogarty International Center Advisory Board at the National Institutes of Health, and the Advisory Anti-Infective Agent Committee of the Food and Drug Administration.

 

[ford_428cj]

How would have Hillary handled the whole Wuhan flu deal?

[spin_dry]

8 minutes ago, Ez ryder said:

wrong 

the whole fucking system is broken the samecsstem you want to run your healthcare .

and again let's not forget what your whole life every dick in DC  and every reporter in the countery was revolving around at this time 

 

here is your unqualified 

Robert R. Redfield, MD

Robert R. Redfield, MD, is the 18th Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. He has been a public health leader actively engaged in clinical research and clinical care of chronic human viral infections and infectious diseases, especially HIV, for more than 30 years.

He served as the founding director of the Department of Retroviral Research within the U.S. Military’s HIV Research Program, and retired after 20 years of service in the U.S. Army Medical Corps. Following his 

military service, he co-founded the University of Maryland’s Institute of Human Virology with Dr. William Blattner and Dr. Robert C. Gallo and served as the Chief of Infectious Diseases and Vice Chair of Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

Dr. Redfield made several important early contributions to the scientific understanding of HIV, including the demonstration of the importance of heterosexual transmission, the development of the Walter Reed staging system for HIV infection, and the demonstration of active HIV replication in all stages of HIV infection.

In addition to his research work, Dr. Redfield oversaw an extensive clinical program providing HIV care and treatment to more than 5,000 patients in the Baltimore/Washington, D.C. community.

Dr. Redfield served as a member of the President’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS from 2005 to 2009, and was appointed as Chair of the International Subcommittee from 2006 to 2009.

He is a past member of the Office of AIDS Research Advisory Council at the National Institutes of Health, the Fogarty International Center Advisory Board at the National Institutes of Health, and the Advisory Anti-Infective Agent Committee of the Food and Drug Administration.

 

Every time one of his appointees is called upon there’s a failure and firing. This will be no different. 

[Angry ginger]

1 hour ago, Jimmy Snacks said:

Simple as that

wrong he only surrounds himself with the finest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Jimmy Snacks]

[racer254]

You tds sufferers are a pathetic bunch.   Sweden is taking a different approach, but I don't see them blaming shit on their prime minister.   But lo and behold the intellectuals in this thread.

[Momorider]

11 hours ago, spin_dry said:

Trump put bad people in charge. 

11 hours ago, Jimmy Snacks said:

Simple as that

[Kev144]

2 minutes ago, Momorider said:

Of course you'd pull trumps pud twink

[Momorider]

6 minutes ago, Kev144 said:

Of course you'd pull trumps pud twink

Homo posts what? Faggot