Dr. Nicole Saphier: Criticizing the COVID response – essential, but first focus on crisis at hand
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In the recent CNN documentary entitled “COVID War,” Dr. Sanjay Gupta asked Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator of the White House coronavirus response under the Trump administration, what she thinks now about early handlings of the pandemic.
Birx remarked “There were about 100,000 deaths that came from that original surge. All of the rest of them, in my mind, could have been mitigated or decreased substantially.”
Undoubtedly, early, the U.S. was hamstrung by insufficient testing and a lack of information; later, it became plagued with widespread distrust of scientific recommendations and fatigue.
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Early in 2020, the virus spread undetected in the Northeast and Northwest before adequate testing showed the reality. From these travel hubs, Americans fled lockdowns while spring breakers left, and so went the virus.
It was only a week earlier, on March 8, 2020, that Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), said “there’s no reason to be walking around with a mask.”
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The World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic on March 11, followed by President Trump declaring a national emergency in the U.S two days later.
On March 26, Dr, Birx reassured Americans in a press conference, saying “there is no situation in the United States right now that warrants that kind of discussion [that ventilators or ICU hospital beds might be in limited supply].”
Had interstate travel restrictions been implemented in early March while only the affected areas underwent strict, short-term lockdowns, the “slow the spread” mantra would have had a more profound effect and the rest of the country may have not been fatigued by the time the virus spread.
In April 2020, as reported by The New York Times, Dr. Birx, told the Trump administration the virus was not going to be a long-term problem for the U.S.
Fast forward to March 2021, according to Birx, more than 80% of American deaths could have been mitigated if lockdown measures had been stricter and more drawn out. This, despite Birx having led the creation of a reopening plan presented by Trump on April 16, 2020, with voluntary standards for states to end coronavirus lockdowns.
A decentralized federal system, like in the U.S., makes states agreeing to nationwide measures complicated. Add a highly partisan presidential election year and the rhetoric was bound to peak.
The U.S. reached 100,000 deaths by the end of May 2020.
There is both praise and blame to go around, but timing is everything.
The U.S. may have been able to prevent roughly 36,000 deaths from COVID-19 if broad social distancing measures had been put in place just one week earlier in March, according to an analysis from Columbia University.
Disease-control measures such as mask-wearing, social distancing and limiting capacity slowed the spread of the virus. However, behavior counteracts their effect.
By the time the third wave began in October, the virus was widespread across the country and pandemic fatigue had peaked. The result: a very deadly winter with approximately 300,000 deaths being reported from November 2020 to March 2021.
Today, nearly 550,000 people in the U.S. have died from COVID-19, per Johns Hopkins University data.
Following the release of promotional clips for the “COVID War” documentary, Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., tweeted,
“The malicious incompetence that resulted in hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths starts at the top, with the former President and his enablers. And who was one of his enablers? Dr. Birx, who was afraid to challenge his unscientific rhetoric and wrongfully praised him.”
Calls for a formal investigation by many followed.
Such an investigation will be important. In the wake of a crisis it is crucial to learn from retrospective review, even if that review is painful.
But a premature review conducted while thousands are still dying daily presents promise as well as risks. We need to keep our eyes fixed on the goal of herd immunity and commitment to vaccination and lessening the spread at this moment. Maybe now isn’t the time to stir up further discord, skepticism and anger. It may make the path to herd immunity even more difficult.
Remember, when Dr. Birx says “we” she is referring to a collective effort in which she played a crucial role as did many others in the documentary. If the architects of the initial response say it was wrongheaded, might not people be inclined to think that the words coming out of public health officials’ mouths today may also be incorrect?
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We badly need whatever meager amount of civic trust that we have left. On a good day, science has space for multiple opinions. There is both praise and blame to go around, but timing is everything.
We don’t yet have hindsight on COVID-19. It is not in the rearview mirror. It is very much with us. We need to focus on the road ahead, before we start looking back.
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