A congressional hearing aimed at assessing the recent coronavirus outbreak, and the response to it was held on Feb. 5. Its the first hearing of its kind, as numbers affected by the virus continue to grow, mostly in China.
The House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, and Nonproliferation heard testimony from three health policy experts, including Jennifer Nuzzo, associate professor and senior scholar from Johns Hopkins University; Jennifer Bouey, a senior policy researcher at RAND Corporation; and Ron Klain, the former White House Ebola response coordinator.
Rep. Ami Bera (D-Calif.), chairman of the subcommittee, said in his opening remarks that fighting the virus is a bipartisan initiative. As of Feb. 5, there have been 12 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the United States, with the latest being reported in Wisconsin by state health officials.
“A lot of things in Washington, D.C., are partisan; this is not partisan. We as congress understand how rapidly this is moving,” Bera said. “We also understand that we want to make sure that the administration has all the tools and resources that they need right now.”
Also, on Feb. 5, federal officials announced that laboratories across the United States would receive coronavirus testing kits this week from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
In her testimony, Nuzzo noted that the trajectory of this epidemic is “hard to predict with certainty.” Several major Chinese cities, including Hangzhou, Nanjing, and Zhengzhou, have recently announced new rules to enact partial lockdowns.
“Evidence is mounting each day that it may not be possible to contain this virus,” she said. “What this means is that if its not possible to completely stop disease transmission, we must plan for how we will mitigate the impacts of the virus as it spreads.”
Slow Chinese Response
During the hearing, ranking member Ted Yoho (R-Fla.) dedicated a portion of his remarks to criticize the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) overall response to the virus.
“The CCP continues to endanger people throughout Asia by using the WHO to advance its political agenda through the exclusion of Taiwan,” he said in his opening remarks. Officials in Taiwan say they are receiving little information from WHO.
Yoho said the Chinese regime has failed to work collaboratively with other nations to fight the virus.
“Despite the severity and infectiousness of this virus, the Chinese government has so far refused to fully cooperate with the global community,” he said. “We hope this is something that does not become politicized.”
Yoho brought up Read More – Source
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The Epoch Times
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