According to The New York Times, the group will be disbanded as part of the first phase of the phase-out of restrictive measures in the US.
The U.S. Presidential Administration, Donald Trump, plans to terminate the coronavirus task force led by Vice President Michael Pence in the coming weeks. This was reported by The New York Times on Tuesday, citing White House officials.
According to her, Olivia Troy, an adviser to Pence, who advised him on the activities of the group, told the members of the unit that his work would be discontinued within a few weeks. According to the publication, the Coronavirus Unit may not be officially announced, but its workload will gradually decrease. For example, the meeting of the team members on Monday was cancelled; it was also not held on 2 May.
An official interlocutor indicated that the Coronavirus Control Team will be disbanded as part of the first phase of the phase-out of restrictive measures in the United States, after which the focus will be on vaccine development, testing and treatment of patients with coronavirus.
In response to a question from a journalist at a briefing in Washington about the publication of The New York Times, Pence confirmed the information about the disbandment of the group and specified that “the right time is being discussed for a special group to complete its work and to continue taking action already at the level of agencies.”
“I think we’re looking at Memorial Day [celebrated in the U.S. on the last Monday of May in memory of soldiers who died in the line of duty], early June, as a time when we can begin to transfer authority to our agencies to address issues [against the coronavirus] in a more traditional form”, – the White House press pool quotes the vice president as saying.
White House spokeswoman Kaylie McInani denied that the disbandment of the task force is due to the fact that the Trump administration no longer intends to involve medical experts in addressing the pandemic situation. “U.S. President Donald Trump will continue to take an informed approach to safely lift restrictions in the country”, – she wrote on Twitter.
On January 30, then White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham announced that Trump had set up a special team to deal with coronavirus proliferation. On February 27, the American leader announced that Pence would coordinate measures to combat the spread of coronavirus.
On the coronavirus situation in the United States.
According to Johns Hopkins University, which makes calculations based on data from federal and local authorities, to date in the U.S. coronavirus diagnosed almost 1.2 million people, more than 70 thousand died, more than 187 thousand recovered. The outbreak of coronavirus-induced disease was recorded in late 2019 in Central China and has spread to most countries. On 11 March, it was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization.