If President-elect Joe Biden is paying his coronavirus adviser anything, he should try getting a refund. Michael Osterholm doesn’t seem to know much more about the pandemic than the average cable news anchor, and that kind of knowledge is basically free of charge.
Biden’s frontman on the pandemic was asked Tuesday on CNN about the new variants of the coronavirus that have popped up around the world. His thoughts more or less mirrored the same talking points put out by the Democratic National Committee: There needs to be a “national response” and “everything needs to be on the table right now.”
Asked specifically how he would limit the spread of any of the new virus strains, Osterholm only knew what wouldn’t work. Widespread testing would only provide a “snapshot” of infection and is, therefore “inadequate.” A 14-day quarantine for travelers coming into the United States isn’t possible because governors and mayors don’t have the “bandwidth” for that.
His plan? For the second time, he said, “We have to put all these options on the table.” And then came a helpful warning. “This is why we can’t waste a day in getting vaccines to people right now,” said Osterholm. “We’ve gotta get this out.”
Thank you for stating obvious points that no one disagrees with. Highly effective vaccines arrived quicker than almost anyone predicted, and they are, at this very moment, being distributed on a mass scale.
So what is Osterholm good for? Maybe Democrats should just admit that “the science” isn’t any better coming from their experts than it has been coming from anywhere else, including the Trump administration’s.
