The 15 Day Coronavirus "Slow the Spread" Plan

The 15 Day Coronavirus “Slow the Spread” Plan
The View from the Middle

There is an old adage that stipulates, “No one is perfect”. That may be more than just an axiom and probably should be stated as a fact. This adage/fact goes for countries as well. In the beginning stages of the Coronavirus spread, China was far from perfect. They hid information and or lied about its impact from other countries which allowed this virus to reach a pandemic level. Italy obviously fell asleep at the wheel and even here in the United States we were not perfect, but in my opinion, we were pretty darn good.

The travel ban to and from China was a great early move that, while actually criticized by some at the time, has been acknowledged by health professionals to have saved thousands of infections and maybe even lives. I questioned the travel ban on Europe a few days ago only to hear in the last couple of days that the epicenter of this virus has moved there. I guess the President’s task force was actually ahead of the game and made another good move with that ban. We have had some glitches with the test availability early on, but that now seems to have been fixed. I was at Quest Diagnostics this morning, just to have my blood drawn for a lipids test, and I asked about the Coronavirus testing. My nurse assured me that if anyone needed a test (recommended by their doctor) they are having no problems completing them.

Communications in the beginning was mixed. Trump, playing his dual role of “Encourager in Chief” and health advisor, may have been too positive. I think he was just trying to give some balance to the media who was in early-onset panic mode. I don’t think this caused anyone to book a cruise or plan a convention so few if any people suffered from his statements. For the last three weeks, however, since Pence was tapped to lead the Coronavirus task force, the communications have been excellent.

All of the advice from this task force has come from healthcare professionals like Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. Deborah Birx and our country’s Surgeon General, Jerome Adams. Early on they communicated some common-sense practices that everyone should be following, like washing your hands, etc. I repeated that advice in my article on March 2nd. This task force has been meeting daily and almost without rest to track this disease around the world and around this country and giving their best counsel to the administration. They are now holding DAILY press briefings, which I encourage all of you watch. In fact, I would suggest you turn off the news and watch this press conference every day. You will be better informed and encouraged at the same time.

Yesterday, they announced a 15-day plan to slow the spread of the Coronavirus. This was brilliant in a number of ways. First of all, people are having a hard time grasping when this threat will be over. It’s too far away. The challenge is too big. This plan gives us all a short-term strategy that we can execute in the next two weeks that will have a major impact on America’s recovery. It reminds me of the movie “What About Bob” where Dr. Leo Marvin (played by Richard Dreyfuss) wrote a book called “Baby Steps”. His patient “Bob” is played by Bill Murray and suffers from seemingly countless phobias. Sounds a lot like our country right now. It’s just the kind of movie you may want to watch now to take you mind off of this virus. In the movie, the doctor’s book suggests that if you can’t grasp the end of a long project or assignment, you should make little, short-term goals (baby steps) that will eventually get you there. This 15 day plan is “just what the doctor ordered”, so to speak for our country.

Kudos to Pence, Fauci, Birx, Adams and the entire task force for utilizing this “baby steps” strategy for our entire country. For your convenience, I have included a link to the 15 Day Plan below. Just copy it into your browser and It will take you right there. THIS is the kind of information you should be consuming throughout this challenging time. And remember, 99% of the people who contract this virus will recover completely.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/03.16.20_coronavirus-guidance_8.5x11_315PM.pdf

John Kennedy once said, “Victory (success) has a thousand fathers, but Defeat (failure) is an orphan.” If all of the steps that this administration is taking works, and the impact on America is less than predicted (and some predictions have been draconian) we will have every politician in America trying to take credit. Let’s just hope that happens and we can all laugh at their antics. God bless you all and this great country. Be healthy, sane and safe.