Even while some administration officials are been affected by the virus, the White House is surprisingly encouraging economies across the nation to reopen. After coming in a low-risk contact with a staff member who later tested positive for COVID-19, Fauci said he would introduce a "modified quarantine."
Fauci's contact with the aforesaid staffer has been considered low risk because he did not have close contact with the person, and also he tested negative for coronavirus. The FDA (Food and Drug Administration) Commissioner Stephen Hahn informed staff on Apr. 8 that he would be self-quarantining after coming in contact with CDC Director Robert Redfield, an official who recently tested positive, Bloomberg reported.
Redfield, 68, said he will also go into quarantine for two weeks and work from home during that period. Although officials going into quarantine are remaining mum about the person to whom they were exposed, this comes shortly after Vice President Mike Pence’s press secretary, Katie Miller tested positive for the virus. Miller usually participates in the coronavirus task force meetings.
While practicing the modified quarantine, Fauci will stay home for fourteen days, but may visit his office at the National Institutes of Health and could go to the White House if he is called. Aside from that, Fauci is slated to go to the Senate to give facts at a hearing that will comprise numerous other White House officials. Hahn and Redfield, on the other, will remotely testify at the hearing.
Miller is married to Trump's top adviser Stephen Miller, who tested negative. On top of that, one of the president's personal valets, whose duty involves, serving him meals, has been tested positive for COVID-19. Moreover, Ivanka's personal assistant was also tested positive recently, but she has been working from home for about two months and has not been in contact with Trump’s daughter for quite some time now.
Reports about three key officials going into quarantine while the country continues fighting against the pandemic are surfacing at a time when top health officials are been neglected as the White House deviates its focus on reopening economies across the country. It's been weeks since the task force held a press briefing.
Public health professor at Johns Hopkins University, Joshua Sharfstein tells Politico that the federal government's inability to see this as a public health crisis can be deemed a blind spot. Sharfstein says this public health crisis is nothing like we have seen in a century, but we are not treating it seriously.