Who is protecting Americans from Marburg right now
The U.S. had a playbook — now undermined — for responding to biological threats
Psaki is a former U.S. coordinator for global health security of the National Security Council.
On Saturday, Jan. 11, as we entered the final week of the Biden-Harris administration, I got a call about a suspected Marburg outbreak in Tanzania. Marburg virus disease is like its close cousin Ebola, but worse. It can have a mortality rate as high as 80% and, unlike at least one strain of Ebola, we do not have an approved vaccine or treatment for Marburg. Our best hope for protecting Americans when an outbreak like this occurs is to stop it at its source. When the World Health Organization heard about the suspected outbreak, one of their first actions was to alert the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The call was not a complete surprise. These outbreaks are increasing in frequency — this was the 12th Marburg or Ebola outbreak we faced during the Biden-Harris administration. But we had made it to January 2025 without a single case of either disease in the United States. One of the reasons we were successful was that we had a plan in place — a playbook — for responding to biological threats, which we implemented quickly and aggressively every time there was a new outbreak. We had partners in place, from WHO to vaccine manufacturers, who were on standby and ready to act. We had emergency funding available that could quickly be redirected. And we had people — at the National Security Council and across federal departments and agencies — who had responded to countless biological threats, could get on a plane at a moment’s notice if needed, and, most importantly, who knew how to keep Americans safe.
As I’ve watched the Trump administration announce a series of actions that undermine our ability to detect and respond to biological threats, including stopping CDC staff from communicating or traveling and sending National Security Council staff home indefinitely, I wonder: Who is protecting the American people from Marburg right now?
https://www.statnews.com/2025/01/27/marburg-virus-ebola-who-cdc/
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jls4561
(1,976 posts)That’ll show’em!
Sadly, this is a thing he’s most likely to do about Marburg.
lapfog_1
(30,527 posts)Trump wants to live in a world where "North America ( including Greenland and Canada )" are his little kingdom and we don't need to care about or do business with the rest of the world.
Russia has proven itself to be a paper tiger militarily.
That leave China as the leader of the world... not the free world, there will be no free world, but the leader of the world. Just when we had China on the ropes... they had overextended themselves on their own spending and central planning real estate, they did not address the Covid virus as effectively as even the lame attempt by the USA ( initially ) and the much better Biden rollout of mass vaccines. They are hurting... to the point that Xi keeps making war noises about Taiwan to distract his own people. And now Trump is going to drive South America, the middle east, some of europe and most of Asia into their "loving" arms.
So much for PNAC ( those crazy mofos, John Bolton will be looking out for Iranian snipers ).
But the world will suffer as well without us participating.
appalachiablue
(43,411 posts)PoindexterOglethorpe
(27,172 posts)For one thing, it is not all that easy to get. You have to be in pretty intimate contact with someone who has it, meaning you need to be exposed to blood, bodily fluids, and so on.
The real danger, even without any defunding of health care entities, is that some brand new virus which is extremely deadly, shows up and starts killing like crazy.