MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The United States Senate on Tuesday held the first hearing ever with witnesses and the chairmen appearing remotely due to the coronavirus.
The hearing, led by Tennessee’s senior Sen. Lamar Alexander, answered some important questions on the virus.
“As we deal with this pandemic, we need to make sure we’re ready for the next one,” said Alexander, who opened the hearing from a rustic room in his home in Maryville, Tennessee.
Alexander is spending 14 days in isolation, with his dog because one of his staffers tested positive for COVID-19.
He began by acknowledging the obvious temptations of a highly partisan, televised event.
“Before we spend too much time finger pointing, I’d like to suggest all of us, the United States and every country, so far as I can tell, is underestimating this virus.”
His admonition was seemingly forgotten, as soon as he passed the microphone.
“The Trump administration’s response to this public health emergency so far has been a disaster,” said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Washington).
“It is sad to say, that we have a president of the United States, the leader of our country, that from day one downplayed the dangers facing this country from the pandemic,” said Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
Alexander was the first to quiz the four experts from the president’s coronavirus task force. He asked Dr. Anthony Fauci what he would say to the chancellor of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, or the principal of a public school about how to persuade parents and students to return to school in August.
Fauci said treatments or a vaccine for coronavirus would not be available by the fall.
“The idea of having treatments available or a vaccine to facilitate the re-entry of students into the fall term would a bit of something of a bridge too far,” Fauci said.
Fauci, who’s also isolating at home after being exposed to the virus, agreed with the senator that the nation will initially have to rely on widespread testing.
“All roads to work and school go back to testing,” he said. “The more tests we conduct, the better we can identify those who are sick and exposed, and we can quarantine the sick and exposed instead of trying to quarantine the whole country.”
But with the reopening of the country, Fauci believes there will be an uptick in infections and believes the future depends on how we respond today.
“It’s how we deal with it, and how successful we are in putting the clamps on it that will prevent us from getting the kind of rebound, that not only from the point of illness and death, that is unacceptable, but it will set us back in our progress toward reopening the country.”
Fauci also said he hopes with increased testing, a stockpile of personal protective equipment, along with a plan to identify, isolate and contact trace, that the United States would be better prepared if or when it gets a second wave of COVID-19.