Headline Roundup • March 21st, 2020
US Intelligence Reportedly Anticipated Coronavirus Pandemic
Summary from the AllSides News Team
Featured Coverage of this Story
Washington Examiner
The U.S. Intelligence Community warned President Trump in early 2020 that the Chinese Communist Party was downplaying the real threat posed by the novel coronavirus outbreak, which has since become a pandemic with more than 300,000 confirmed cases around the world.
The Trump administration was advised in January and February that Chinese officials “appeared to be minimizing the severity of the outbreak” and “were not being candid about the true scale of the crisis,” according to a report Friday by the Washington Post.
Washington Post
Taken together, the reports and warnings painted an early picture of a virus that showed the characteristics of a globe-encircling pandemic that could require governments to take swift actions to contain it. But despite that constant flow of reporting, Trump continued publicly and privately to play down the threat the virus posed to Americans. Lawmakers, too, did not grapple with the virus in earnest until this month, as officials scrambled to keep citizens in their homes and hospitals braced for a surge in patients suffering from covid-19, the disease caused...
The Hill
The intelligence community was warning of the danger posed by the novel coronavirus throughout January and February as the White House downplayed the threat and was slow to roll out nationwide measures, reports show.
U.S. officials familiar with spy agency reporting told The Washington Post that the reports did not clarify when the virus might spread in the U.S. or recommend specific steps to prevent an outbreak, but they did track the international spread of the coronavirus and warn that China was initially dismissing the seriousness of what is now...
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