Donald Trump is the 45th president of the United States. He had a very strange response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In our opinion, he could’ve done more to save the country; if he wanted to get a second term as president, his only hope was to boost the economy. Then again, he isn’t a scientist, but he could’ve listened more to the scientists around him and chosen a more effective coronavirus task force. To him, however, loyalty was more important than expertise when choosing the members of this task force. Later on, Mike Pence was added to the group.

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Amid the chaos that the novel coronavirus has caused, there was an election between President Donald Trump and former Vice-President, now President-Elect Joe Biden. Donald Trump has been trying to get supporters onto his side to win a second term, and maybe even a lifetime term! However, nothing comes easy, and the president will have to try his best to dodge upcoming threats, including his position in office, in which he may lose.

 

Now, about trends. Some seem to be going up, while others are going down. We will be going over the various things that Trump has been saying, and/or doing, to try and contain the virus. Some things that Trump has been doing are… questionable. Well, you’ll find out yourself, and keep in mind, this is our opinion, as you may think otherwise.

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Firstly, quotes. We have many quotes in this article, some from Twitter, some from interviews, and some from elsewhere.

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One of the things that Trump has repeatedly said over and over again is, “We will have a vaccine very soon” and “We have this under control”.

 

Dr. Fauci has said during a White House meeting that…

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“... although this is the fastest we have ever gone from a sequence of a virus to a trial, it still would not be applicable to the epidemic unless we really wait about a year to a year and a half.” (February 26, 2020)

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Trump has continuously claimed that he is doing a great job at containing the virus even from the start of this pandemic. With no sense of urgency, Trump tweeted on January 22 that “we have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.” This was followed, on February 27, by “we have done an incredible job. We’re going to continue, it’s going to disappear one day. It’s a miracle. It will disappear.” There is little to no evidence at all that any sort of virus could just vapourize into thin air and never be seen by anyone ever again.

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Before that, on February 10, he stated “looks like by April, you know in theory when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.” At that time, there was no evidence that the COVID-19 disease would go away under heat even though some viruses do. If the COVID-19 was like the viruses that disappear under heat, it wouldn’t have survived the summer of 2020.

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Trump has also repeatedly reminded us about the flu. On February 26, 2020, “This is a flu. This is like the flu.” However, at the end of March, he stated, “It’s not the flu. It’s vicious.” 

 

The flu. I mean… Yes, it’s sort of like the flu, with similar symptoms and all, but we feel that COVID-19 is more dangerous. Vicious. Threatening. Deadly. This new virus is definitely not meant to be messed with. Especially since it is a new virus, and is especially hazardous for families and people with pre-existing medical conditions.

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Although Trump is often downplaying the virus, he isn’t saying that it’s a hoax anymore, which is a change. In the beginning of the pandemic, he suspended travel from China for people who weren’t from the United States to limit contamination in the USA. Contrary to Trump’s orders, many Americans still came back from China with no quarantine orders in place and disregarding the safety of others; it didn’t really help contain the spread of COVID-19 through their communities. He once stated that he was downplaying the virus because he didn’t want everyone to panic, although this is a somewhat reasonable answer, we think the American people would like to hear all the true information about this virus. When the public does find out how serious it is, they might criticize him for hiding the true nature of COVID-19. We think that Trump is downplaying the virus because, maybe, he thinks that acknowledging it will just panic people more and make the people afraid to come out, which he may think is a bad thing and that everyone should have freedom. Or, maybe, he is trying to control the virus, but doesn’t want anyone to freak out or panic about it.

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While all the trends are highly interesting, we will now move into ethics.

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Was it right for President Trump to choose a Coronavirus task force with minimal scientific experience? We feel that he should’ve prioritised experience over loyalty. For example, he chose Alex Azar to lead the COVID-19 task force, and the only public health officials were Dr. Robert Redfield and Dr. Anthony Fauci. However, Dr. Fauci has been leading every epidemic response for the last 40 years, so he probably should’ve been the task force leader. As for Dr. Redfield, he’s a virologist (studies viruses) and is the current director of the United States CDC. Most other people on the task force were mainly businessmen and politicians, which, in our opinion, most likely isn’t something that would work well. Knowing the president, he would likely choose a mostly Republican task force so they could get along and is able to get most things going his way. Though Dr. Fauci does not identify as any party, President Trump has been claiming that Fauci’s a Democrat: “he’s a Democrat, everybody knows that.” (October 15, 2020)

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Other than that, there are still many unanswered (or even unanswerable!) questions floating around. Was it right for President Trump to refuse to wear masks? Was it right for Trump to call COVID-19 the “China Plague”? Was it right for him to spread false information about COVID-19? Was it right for him to say that he’s immune to COVID-19?  While these questions could go on for an eternity, we can only answer a few, as some of these questions may not even be able to be answered by President Trump himself! And, well, we feel that this section is getting a bit long, so we’re going leave you hanging about wondering about these questions.

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One thing we want to talk quickly about is Trump's attitude towards COVID-19. At first, he said on twitter that “China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!” However, later on, he tweeted… “Asian Americans are VERY angry at what China has done to our Country, and the World. Chinese Americans are the most angry of all. I don’ t blame them!” To this Democratic Grace Meng from New York’s 6th and the US House of Representatives replied: “We are very angry at you. You use racism to disguise your lack of responsiveness and responsibility. American lives of all backgrounds have been lost. Your words have led to increased discrimination against Asian Americans which will outlast the coronavirus.”

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Now that that is out of the way, let’s talk about how other people viewed Trump’s response to the COVID-19. At a CNN interview, the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, said, “The fact is that [Trump’s] been a failure in every way, right from the start his denial calling it a hoax, his delay and all the rest has gotten us into a very bad place…” We think that she’s possibly criticizing President Donald Trump’s reaction plus his handling of COVID-19.

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While the USA could’ve used a test made by the WHO, alternatively named the World Health Organization, they chose to make their own test instead, which brings up the question, why did they choose not to use the test made by the WHO?

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As of February 26, the United States was testing less than 100 people per day; other countries were testing thousands.

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In their own test, Part 1 and 2 worked; however, Part 3 didn’t, and they made a big deal out of it which suspended lots of testing... which ended up with them ignoring it. Part 3 was supposed to be the part that looked for other types of coronaviruses, such as SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome). Part 3 is not that important, in our opinion, since health officials haven’t identified any other coronavirus that has the possibility to be a pandemic in 2020.

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Trump has said that he and his administration expect to have every American vaccinated and protected from COVID-19 by April 2021. However, as Desiderius Erasmus once said, “Prevention is better than cure”, and that most likely is true.

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President Trump does not like wearing masks in public, so some citizens might think, “If the President isn’t wearing a mask! I don’t have to either!” If President Donald Trump and some of the Republicans in higher seat positions encouraged mask wearing, the United States of America would most likely not be in the state they are right now.

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Image from: Reuters

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There are now three vaccines in Phase 3 of testing: Moderna, AstraZeneca, Phizer&BioNTech; some are already authorized for emergency use in the United States. As Trump tweeted on November 16: “Another vaccine just announced, This time by Moderna, 95% effective. For those great ‘historians’, please remember that these great discoveries, which will end the China plague, all took place under my watch!” We think that yes, they happened under Trump’s watch, but he shouldn’t be given credit for making these vaccines because he didn’t really do anything to help with the making of it. If he were a scientist or if he contributed towards the making of it he could’ve said that, but he didn’t donate money; he makes it sound like he will be/is the reason that COVID-19 will end.

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President Trump doesn’t like science, as you might know; however, maybe things would have resulted in a different way if he had listened to the scientists. Firstly, if he had listened to the doctors and scientists about how wearing masks can slow down the spread of COVID-19, other people, including his supporters, might wear masks more if they saw President Trump wearing one. Secondly, if he believed global warming was an actual thing, he would’ve tried to send help to California and other states or countries who suffered from the wildfires, and maybe not as many people and animals would’ve had their homes burnt down or damaged. This also connects to the fact that fires give off lots of carbon dioxide and that contributes to the global warming of the whole planet.

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Let’s now see what’s happening in other countries. While the United States and South Korea both had their first case of COVID-19 on January 20,  South Korea has done a much better job containing the virus than the United States. In South Korea, the politicians let the medical and science professionals take over, unlike the United States, where Trump decided to put lots of loyal businessmen into the coronavirus task force. The first case for South Korea was a woman who entered the country from Wuhan, China, which was the epicenter of the virus at the time, and the country didn’t have a test kit approved, but they started to use it anyways. The head of the equivalent of the Centers of Disease Control basically said, “Manufacture me these tests now, and forget about the approval process. Start using them, start testing. We will come back to make sure it’s accurate, but we’ll do that while you’re already in the field.” By this quote, you can tell that they realized how serious this virus was. They quickly realized that the virus spread easily by talking or singing loudly and took precautions to prevent COVID-19 from spreading to the rest of the country. If the United States had done that, and if President Trump had stopped ignoring the seriousness of the virus, many, many deaths could have been prevented. However, if President Trump told everybody, people may think, “Oh, he’s just overreacting, the virus couldn’t be that deadly….” or, “Hmm… at least he’s not ignoring the virus...” or, “He could/should do more to protect the US citizens...”, and while his response wasn’t the best, it may have been effective in some people’s eyes.

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Trump getting COVID-19 was a big shock, or also a not so big shock, to the world. He was most likely immediately rushed to a hospital, where they gave him a cocktail of experimental treatment. He also got Remdesivir and Dexamethasone: two drugs that may help him recover. Dexamethasone is used to treat many medical conditions such as skin diseases, severe allergies, asthma and lung disease. Remdesivir isn’t approved by the Food and Drug Administration (also known as the FDA). It has a couple of side effects, including anemia, and liver and kidney toxicity. While Remdesivir isn’t proved to be helpful, he also took Dexamethasone; some people die after a month of using it, because although it reduces inflammation, it also subdues the immune system. If someone of that power would have had their life in danger, we would’ve wanted them to the hospital as well, so that they could’ve recovered quickly, and we also probably would’ve given them any helpful medicine even if it isn’t scientifically proven to help. Basically the whole world would know who they are, and their supporters would feel very sad and disheartened to hear of the loss of someone that is/was very important to them; they may even go through depression. In their mind, they might think, “If this person isn’t alive, I don’t deserve to live anymore”. Though we do think if they get the drug, why can’t normal people going through the same thing get to use it? Is it because the drug’s still in testing? Or is it because it may cause side effects? Or is it because it’s hard to make? We personally think that it may be because it may not be safe for the user, since, well, if a drug hasn’t been through testing, you won’t know if it’s safe for you and your family, because, like, what if it protects you from the virus, but it might cause other effects as well, like a cold or a fever.

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“I will be leaving the great Walter Reed Medical Center today at 6:30 P.M., feeling really good! Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!” Trump said on October 5, 2020. However, some of the drugs he got weren’t even available to the public. He did not acknowledge that he is the president, and he clearly would get way more attention and help than a normal citizen. Also, what’s not to fear about a new virus that doesn't have a cure and has killed over 200,000 citizens of the United States? Him recovering from it will motivate others to not be afraid of OVID-19. People who believe what President Trump says might think, “He’s a senior, seniors are more prone to the virus, he recovered, and therefore there’s nothing to worry about!”.

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President Trump has disliked science even before becoming president. In January 25, 2014, he tweeted, “NBC news just called it a great freeze-coldest winter in years. Is our country still spending money on the GLOBAL WARMING HOAX?” While global warming may not seem to be happening, we feel that it is definitely happening and needs to be solved, as it may wipe out all of human-kind, and cause difficulties for the next few generations (and more!) someday. We feel that the president should not only care for the current Americans, but the Americans of the future, as what the president does will affect the citizens of America one way or another. For example, if President Trump ignores global warming and starts to burn coal to disprove that global warming is real, then, the future Americans may suffer because of him trying to disprove global warming.

 

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If we were Trump, we would just accept that global warming was a thing and try and encourage people to try to stop global warming. We would also try and spread awareness about the coronavirus and help stop the spread by wearing masks and not going out unless necessary. By doing that, there would probably be less deaths and cases. And more people would wear masks instead of just being like ‘la da la da la, nothings going to happen to me cause I’m immune because I’ve gotten it before!’

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Image: Chad Batka

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In conclusion, we think Trump's response was somewhat acceptable—he closed borders to China and other countries at the beginning of the pandemic to limit contamination from foreign countries, which was a smart move. Although he could’ve listened to the scientists around him, take the virus seriously as a threat, and actually caring about the virus that's about to become a pandemic rather than going golfing, we think that he’s done an alright job at taking care of the COVID-19 pandemic so far; however, there could be improvements in taking action and he could’ve been more productive. Maybe he could’ve listened to more of the serious parts of conversation, for example, Alex Azar, the US Secretary of Health and Safety Services, has said both, "This is very serious…” and “We have this under control…” The president could’ve listened to both and spread the message instead of just saying that “they'' have it under control. We think if Azar had just said, “This is very serious,” the president would take the virus seriously, but he didn’t. President Trump just decided to listen to the “we have this under control” part.

That year was crazy enough: 200,000 deaths by coronavirus reached by the U.S., 1 million deaths reached by the world, the coronavirus even existing, mutations, wildfires, the deaths of multiple people (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Kobe Bryant, and more), and more. However, let’s hope that everything gets better soon and the coronavirus gets put under control. But right now, what’s done is done; we can’t change the past, nor can we change the future, all we can do right now is try the best we can to help stop the spread by doing our part.