Obama officials walked Trump aides through global pandemic exercise in 2017: report

The Obama administration walked incoming Trump administration officials through a hypothetical scenario in which a pandemic worse than the 1918 Spanish flu shut down cities like Seoul and London in early 2017, Politico reported.

During the briefing, Trump administration officials were told such a pandemic would likely lead to circumstances such as shortages of ventilators and that a coordinated national response would be “paramount,” according to documents obtained by the publication.

Of the Trump administration officials present during the meeting, about 66 percent no longer serve in the White House, according to Politico.

“The advantage we had under Obama was that during the first four years we had the same White House staff, the same Cabinet,” former Deputy Labor Secretary Chris Lu, who was present for the meeting, told the publication. “Just having the continuity makes all the difference in the world.”