Quote:
Indeed, experts and advocates argue that the US generally underfunds disease outbreak preparedness and public health programs more broadly. It’s these concerns that led the Obama administration, after the Ebola outbreak, to attempt to scale up preparedness by establishing a White House office dedicated solely to the issue and producing a 69-page playbook in case of an outbreak. The Trump administration, however, neglected and rolled back these efforts, eventually disbanding the White House office.
We’ve seen the results in the botched rollout of coronavirus testing, but PPE offers another example. America could have shored up its supplies of PPE in its strategic stockpile. It could have ensured that there would be surge capacity to boost production in case of emergency. And it should have been doing this all before the coronavirus pandemic.
On February 5, the Department of Health and Human Services asked for $2 billion to buy masks and emergency medical equipment.
Trump cut that by 75%. Now states like Colorado, Massachusetts and Louisiana can't get the supplies they need
That said, you have a current president who is rolling back healthcare spending even further, which is incredibly stupid.