Unprepared for a pandemic

As the nation remembers — or chooses to forget — the events of Jan. 6, 2021, we might also spare a moment to recall what was happening five years ago this month. In January 2020, a novel coronavirus was rapidly spreading in China, and had infected its first Americans. But alarm bells were not yet ringing — at least not publicly. Trump administration trade adviser Peter Navarro privately warned the president that Covid could turn into "a full-blown pandemic, imperiling the lives of millions of Americans." For months, as hospitals and morgues filled, Trump minimized the danger, telling Americans that Covid would soon "go away." He later admitted to journalist Bob Woodward he knew the virus was "deadly stuff," but "I wanted to always play it down." By the time Trump was voted out of office, Covid had killed 400,000 Americans, on its way to 1.2 million — the world's highest death toll.

Five years later, the H5N1 bird flu is spreading among chickens, cattle, and wild birds. So far, 66 people in the U.S. are known to have been infected, mostly from direct contact with animals; one, a Louisiana man who kept backyard chickens, died this week. Scientists say the risk H5N1 will trigger a pandemic remains low. But if the bird flu virus infects a person who's already infected with a human flu virus, the pathogens could swap genetic material, and H5N1 could mutate to spread easily among people through the respiratory tract, like Covid and the deadly Spanish flu a century ago. Then we're in deep trouble. And this country is actually less prepared for a pandemic than it was before Covid. That's because Trump and MAGA allies politicized mask wearing, social distancing, and even vaccination, and coded them as foolish, ineffective liberal responses. If there's a major bird flu outbreak in Trump's second term, will half the country shun vaccines and other preventative measures, with the backing of the anti-science quacks Trump appoints to critical health positions? Let's hope H5N1 does not mutate and jump species. But as we found out the hard way in 2020, hope is not a plan.

This is the editor's letter in the current issue of The Week magazine.

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