U.S. officials change virus testing advice, bewildering experts

confusion

Across the country, public health experts called the change bizarre.

Confusion and bizarre, two more words that define the Trump era. But that was to be expected when a dishonest conman with next to zero understanding of how the US government works was elected. Trump's prior experience was running a property development business he inherited from his rich daddy where he was able to hire armies of highly paid 'fixers' to do the dirty work for him while he was out playing golf and cavorting with porn stars and prostitutes.

It is time for CDC Director Dr. Redfield to resign.  He is an infectious disease expert, but unable to withstand the spoken and unspoken political pressures placed on his office.  These revised guidelines put patient lives at risk and a CDC director who can say "No" is urgently required.

This is treason by Trump. Sacrificing lives for his own reelection. The administration talking heads are acting and talking like the virus has disappeared, speaking of it in the past tense.

Many states still can't get test results for 10 days or more, which make them useless.

This is a bizarre movie now. Trump doesn't scare me. The intellect and naiveté of his supporters scares me. The inmates are running the asylum.

This is treason by Trump

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

Bingo!

The new guidance says it is not necessary for people who don't feel sick but have been in close contact with infected people to get tested. It was posted earlier this week on the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Trump needs to goto jail, this is criminal. Slowing testing down just makes it spread... 40% of people don't show symptoms yet have the ability to continue to infect other people.

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

I was wondering what the Trump supporters’ defense of this would be. As usual, they don’t have one.

The decision came out of meetings of a White House coronavirus task force, HHS officials said.

And who again was put in charge of that task force? I'm sure anyone else could have been more competent than him.

In hindsight, the Trump administration should never have dismantled the pandemic response team that was already put in place.

179,000 dead Americans and people still support Trump.

I’m beginning to think ignorance IS bliss.

It seems every country bar Sweden has no concerted integrated scientific plan. Because of this the only choice, unfortunately, is herd immunity.

don't believe the vaccine hype.

How many more people need to die before this administration does anything useful.

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

Bingo!

Har!

In hindsight, the Trump administration should never have dismantled the pandemic response team that was already put in place.

In hindsight the Obama administration should have made sure we had enough PPE and ventilators to take care of a pandemic.

179,000 dead Americans

Thanks a lot, China. Trump shut down travel from China Jan. 31. Biden would not have.

The Trump Virus will cost him the election.

Repubs doing their best to put all Americans in the grave....

"It's contained, it's just one person from China, wearing a mask is "Anti-American"....it's just one massive failure after another....

Remember when the death toll was 50K, then 70K, then over 100K - today the figure is well over 180K

The estimate a month ago that it will be over 200K by Oct is turning out to be accurate, and perhaps underestimated.

And this President does nothing except play golf...while over 1000 Americans die each day....

The CDC are the experts. But you want to dispute what they said.

He knows enough to listen to the experts,

Ha! Perfect, and had nothing to do with the Whitehouse!

In hindsight the Obama administration should have made sure we had enough PPE and ventilators to take care of a pandemic.

Donald Trump and his administration had 2+ years to restock the strategic reserve. Yet the best he can do is try and blame Obama for 'bad tests' for a virus that didn't even exist in 2016.

In hindsight the Obama administration should have made sure we had enough PPE and ventilators to take care of a pandemic.

You can thank Trump for getting rid of what stockpile they had. Remember that Trump had and continues to have a fascination with dismantling and getting rid of anything related to Obama.

Also, it was a totally bad idea of putting a slumlord like Jared Kushner in charge of the coronovirus response team. The ventilators he bought from Russia were all defective after all.

Because this is the Trump White House, we should never give them the benefit of the doubt. In which case, this change was due to the White House’s desire for less testing, which will lead to less positives, regardless of the reality on the ground.

Of course, non-symptomatic people can still spread the virus, so this will lead to unnecessary deaths. But Trump has showed again and again that he simply doesn’t care about the lives of ordinary people. Anything to help his increasingly desperate re-election effort.

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

Yep, 50 years of public service including 8 as VP. Joe knows what he’s doing unlike the narcissistic sociopath we have until January 20th.

Let's get Joe Biden in there, he knows exactly what he's doing.

Written with sarcasm but I completely agree!

In hindsight, the Trump administration should never have dismantled the pandemic response team that was already put in place.

In hindsight the Obama administration should have made sure we had enough PPE and ventilators to take care of a pandemic.

In hindsight Trump had 2+ years to restock but decided to dismantle it instead.

Nearly 180,000 dead Americans and increasing by 1000+ per day

Thanks a lot, Trump!

Listening to the experts and making them change their message so that it appears that you are listening to them are two different things.

The CDC are the experts. But you want to dispute what they said.

I think people want to dispute what the White House made the experts say.

This all we really need to read to understand what's going on:

The decision came out of meetings of a White House coronavirus task force, HHS officials said.

I haven't been watching the Repub convention. Have the speakers been praising Trump for only losing 170,000 Americans?

The new guidance says it is not necessary for people who don't feel sick but have been in close contact with infected people to get tested. It was posted earlier this week on the website of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

If we boil and break all that down, we can conclude that these new Trumpcare announcements are transparent, politically driven directives to reduce testing, publish fewer cases and economize. Trump and Friends are counting on a pre-election short-term strategy of gaslighting the gullible swathes of the American public in order to minimize the publicity surrounding the enormity of the pandemic and put a smiley face on this American tragedy that, without any coherent federal plan to fight the virus, he has been mainly responsible for. But as Abe once said, "You can't fool all of the people all of the time." My upbeat forecast thus tells me Trumpism is toast.

Serrano...can you prove that Biden would not have shut travel with China down? Maybe he would have shut things down sooner. That's the problem with hypothetical statements....you seem to only have those in your repertoire. But go right ahead with your creative writing.

Side note: the virus serotype that first hit the US, entered from the EU.

Serrano

Thanks a lot, China. Trump shut down travel from China Jan. 31. Biden would not have.

Listening to experts simply makes the forces of darkness look incompetent.

Exactly. Trump doesn't want to hear the experts advice about how to handle pandemics, disasters, and other problems where expert advice is needed. With his sharpie in hand, he want to paint his own picture of the world in a way that makes him look best. As long as he looks good and can pat himself on the back and divert all blame, he feels happy.

did you check the numbers for Sweden? Your (or better their) herd immunity just doesn't work!

Numbers are the same in other countries that have house arrest.

difference is Sweden’s economy and happiness and freedom is intact.

I am sure Trump just changed these guidelines without consulting anyone.  and like always he just willfully overrode the advice of anyone medical expert who proffered an opinion.  He is directly responsible for every covid linked death in America.  Had he done his job nobody in the US would have died from covid.  He deliberately obstructed all the Governors in their brave efforts to save lives.  I guess he secretly likes the idea of dying Americans.  Because he just wants to look good somehow..............

You sure about that?

Sweden is #8 for deaths per million population (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries) and given how low the population densities are in most Swedish cities compared to other cites throughout the world, doesn't really provide much evidence that their methods are applicable elsewhere (or even were suitable for Sweden itself).

Goodlucktoyou

did you check the numbers for Sweden? Your (or better their) herd immunity just doesn't work!

Numbers are the same in other countries that have house arrest.

difference is Sweden’s economy and happiness and freedom is intact.

The GOP chooses to be party of the delusions of one not so bright man, it is their choice.

But Americans should not have to suffer because of these brainless individuals and their lack of courage to stand up to their dictator.

Criminal charges are due here and trump and his klansmen are going to prison once he gets kicked out.