Government virus response needs to focus on the people

Any time there is a major disaster or pandemic, government officials are forced to respond as quickly and efficiently as possible. The outbreak of COVID-19 and its arrival in the United States is certainly no exception, as an absolute whirlwind of a week concluded with uncertainty all around.

A few days ago, President Donald Trump announced that travel from Europe to the United States would be restricted for the next 30 days. The idea is that if people cannot enter the country when returning from Europe, where countries have begun lockdowns to prevent the spread of coronavirus, it will slow down the spread of the virus stateside.

However, I think this measure was too little, too late, as the virus has already made it to the country. While it may prevent more COVID-19 positive people from entering the country, the government should be more focused on what to do now that the virus has already arrived and begun to spread.

There has been much talk lately about a bill proposed in the House of Representatives containing emergency measures designed to help people who need to be quarantined due to the disease. While this bill is certainly a start, I think we need to be doing more to combat the virus so it doesn’t become something bigger.

According to the New York Times, while the bill does provide paid leave for workers in some businesses, there are many which are excluded. In fact, the bill only applies to companies with fewer than 500 employees, which leaves the decision up to the discretion of large corporations in many cases.

In addition, news broke last week that the Federal Reserve planned to inject $1.5 trillion into the stock market, in an effort to prevent a complete meltdown. While the stock market plays a valuable role in the U.S. economy, I have a distinct feeling we won’t see that same level of federal spending when it comes to finding and distributing a cure.

The injection tells me that either we have money as a country, or we don’t care about spending money that we don’t have. So, when a vaccine is created, I want to see the government put the same level of care into providing for its people as it does for its economy.

A cure for a deadly virus shouldn’t be about money. It is a potentially life-or-death situation, and everyone deserves to have access to the cure. However, as soon as the virus hit in the United States, I started hearing stories about people who waited hours just to get tested, or about people who got a test and had to pay upwards of $1000 just for a test, simply because they did not have access to health insurance.

A global pandemic is a time for unity, not division. It is a time to think about what is best for the group, not purely self-preservation. So far, I don’t have much faith that the government will see things this way.

The function of a government is to provide services for its people. In times of crisis, the government is called to do more than usual, and to protect its people from whatever threats may exist. The key is that helping the people must be the government’s first priority, above everything else.