President Trump said the White House coronavirus task force “will continue on indefinitely” one day after Vice President Mike Pence said the group may dissolve at the end of the month.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Trump said reopening the country is paramount and touted the task force’s accomplishments so far “because we can’t close our country down for the next five years,” adding, “We’ve learned a lot.”
Similarly, Pence had said discussions about the task force winding down were underway and that the group could be abolished by the end of the month.
The White House CoronaVirus Task Force, headed by Vice President Mike Pence, has done a fantastic job of bringing together vast highly complex resources that have set a high standard for others to follow in the future. Ventilators, which were few & in bad shape, are now being….
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 6, 2020
“The last four Governors teleconference calls have been conclusively strong,” Trump said. “We may add or subtract people to it, as appropriate. The Task Force will also be very focused on Vaccines & Therapeutics.”
However, Govs. Larry Hogan of Maryland and Andrew Cuomo of New York have said that testing capacity in states dealing with the most severe outbreaks is still lacking. Even as the numbers of new cases and deaths reported each day begin to stabilize, the weekly increase in deaths in the United States still hovers around 20%.
Health and Human Services experts have warned that reopeniing the country too soon could exacerbate the outbreak, causing as many as 3,000 deaths each day starting June 1.
