There are five major priorities in the request to Congress that the White House made on Monday, for at least $2.5 billion in funding.
Those priorities are: first, expanding our surveillance work; second, support for state and local governments’ work; third and fourth, development of therapeutics and vaccines; and fifth, manufacturing and purchase of personal protective equipment like gowns and masks.
As chairman of the President’s Coronavirus Task Force, I am committed to providing regular updates from our coordinated interagency process.
Thank you, Mr. President, for gathering your public health experts here today and for your strong leadership in keeping Americans safe.
I just want to say, I could not be more delighted that you’ve asked the Vice President, my old friend and colleague, to lead this whole-of-government approach with us, under the Emergency Support Function No. 8.
As of today, we have 15 cases of COVID-19 that have been detected in the United States, with only one new case detected in the last two weeks. We also have 3 cases among Americans repatriated from Wuhan; and 42 cases among Americans repatriated who had been stuck on the Diamond Princess in Japan.
The President’s early and decisive actions, including travel restrictions, have succeeded in buying us incredibly valuable time.
This has helped us contain the spread of the virus, handle the cases that we have, and prepare for the possibility that we will need to mitigate broader spread of infections within the United States.
The President’s actions, taken with the strong support of his scientific advisers, have proven to be appropriate, wise, and well-calibrated to the situation.
We are grateful for the hard work that healthcare workers, first responders, communities, and state and local leaders have put into the response so far.
Because of this hard work and the President’s leadership, the immediate risk to the American public has been and continues to be low. Our containment strategy has been working.
At the same time, what every one of our experts and leaders have been saying for more than a month now remains true: The degree of risk has the potential to change quickly, and we can expect to see more cases in the United States.
That is why we have been reminding the American public and our state, local, and private sector partners that they should be aware of what a broader response would look like.
CDC has recommended that the American public and, especially, state and local governments, businesses, and other organizations should refresh themselves on how they would respond in the event that the situation worsens.
We’re encouraging Americans to learn what future steps might be necessary to keep themselves and their communities safe. Knowing these potential steps now can help keep the risk to you and your community low.
Americans can find useful information at cdc.gov/covid19, and we are working closely with government and private sector partners to educate them about preparedness.
Finally, we’ve begun working with Congress to secure the funding we need. There are five major priorities in the request to Congress that the White House made on Monday.
Those priorities are: first, expanding our surveillance work; second, support for state and local governments’ work; third and fourth, development of therapeutics and vaccines; and fifth, manufacturing and purchase of personal protective equipment like gowns and masks.
As chairman of the President’s Coronavirus Task Force, I am committed to providing regular updates from our coordinated interagency process.
We’ve had our top public health leaders, like those joining me here today, speaking to the media many times per day to inform Americans.
The Trump Administration is going to continue to be aggressively transparent, keeping the American people and the media apprised of the situation and what everyone can do.
With that, I’m going to hand things over to Dr. Anne Schuchat. Dr. Schuchat is the senior career official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—the principal deputy director—with an over-30-year career at the CDC in public health and as a member of the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
