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Eerie White House Report Warned of the Economic Impacts of a Pandemic Back in 2019--Trump Ignored It
After years of boasting about his economy, President Donald Trump now claims that increased market instability and skyrocketing unemployment due to the global pandemic couldn't have been predicted or prevented.
This is constantly proving to be untrue.
Numerous instances have come to light of Trump and his administration repeatedly ignoring warnings that the United States wasn't ready for a pandemic of this proportion.
In 2019, a Health and Human Services (HHS) training simulation of a hypothetical virus spreading from China to the United States predicted the inefficient testing and sub-par containment issues we face today. Intelligence officials warned Trump as early as January about the oncoming pandemic, including information about it in his intelligence reports for weeks, to no avail.
Now, a new report indicates that—in addition to HHS and intelligence officials—White House economy experts were warning of the impact of a flu-like pandemic, predicting the economic fallout it's currently wreaking today.
The warning came in a study from the National Security Council, and predicted a sudden economic halt much like the one Americans are currently experiencing as stay-at-home orders are observed across the country.
It even predicted some of the dismissals that were commonplace in the early stages of the outbreak:
"People may conflate the high expected costs of pandemic flu with the far more common, lower-cost seasonal flu. It is not surprising that people might underappreciate the economic and health risks posed by pandemic flu and not invest in ways to reduce these risks."
Trump himself did this less than a month ago:
So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common Flu. It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is… https://t.co/yFtpDzcod4— Donald J. Trump (@Donald J. Trump) 1583765279.0
This news is the latest to indicate that Trump's White House dismissed information which could've significantly lessened the impact of the current pandemic.
I'm so tired of hearing over and over, "there's no way anyone could have predicted the coronavirus outbreak." I gue… https://t.co/rWUNKVVTR3— Blanca Torres (@Blanca Torres) 1585752612.0
They knew a pandemic was inevitable. Why they did not immediately crack open the pandemic response playbook in Janu… https://t.co/5pNZurnR2a— Khanoisseur 🐶🤦🏻♂️🌎 (@Khanoisseur 🐶🤦🏻♂️🌎) 1585717756.0
If only the person in charge would have listened to the WH economists instead to his gut. https://t.co/kA407m8TSV— Paul van der Meer (@Paul van der Meer) 1585726843.0
A big part of the institutional rot that this execrable admin has accelerated is not simply defunding and cutting w… https://t.co/p2s5tpjbWd— Keep It Surly (@Keep It Surly) 1585704734.0
Gross negligence. https://t.co/XxYFcsLFQ2— Renee Legierski (@Renee Legierski) 1585744841.0
People had theories for why the President couldn't be bothered to read it.
If the report wasn’t 1 page long, written in crayon and acted out with sock puppets, Trump didn’t see it. https://t.co/n5wnRgPQsu— Tea Pain (@Tea Pain) 1585746278.0
@nytimes @SethAbramson Probably wasn't written in sharpie & had no pictures— Suzanne Tanner 🇳🇿 (@Suzanne Tanner 🇳🇿) 1585716083.0
@thehill In Trump's defense, the man has the attention span of a puppy, and if the warning involved more than one s… https://t.co/R44M8OC4GF— Skane (@Skane) 1585748365.0
The graphs must not have been "eye-popping" enough https://t.co/7aISoFXHy6— Ryland (@Ryland) 1585747794.0
Health officials now predict that deaths from the virus could surpass 200,000—and that's only if social distancing measures remain rigorous.