Covid-19: What we learned since the first U.S. case was confirmed (cnbc.com)
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But keep politics, as much as possible, out of it, added Slaoui, who resigned last week as chief adviser to Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration’s effort to develop vaccines and drugs for Covid-19.
“We must never again politicize public health issues,” Slaoui said. “I am sure this has cost tens of thousands of lives.”
On government and industryBoth Slaoui and Borio, as well as former FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb, who is now a CNBC contributor and board member of Pfizer and Illumina, said the first year of the pandemic demonstrated the importance of public-private partnerships and of acting on them quickly.
“The refusal of CDC to pivot early to engage commercial labs and commercial test kits left us blind to the early spread,” Gottlieb said.
The U.S.′ ability to detect the virus was hampered in the early weeks by a test from the CDC that turned out to be faulty.
“The virus was able to get deeply rooted in our communities,” he added. “It was a historic failure.”
