US pandemic: Trump's difficult situation

The President of the United States continues in his policy of finding a person responsible for the pandemic crisis, which has led the American country to be the one with the most infections in the world. Trump is moving politically on two distinct levels: not admitting his blame for the late departure in the fight against contagion and, at the same time, trying to be the protagonist in the government of the emergency, without leaving spaces of protagonism to the governors of the states federal, especially to exercise his presidential role on the eve of the electoral challenge. The need to find a scapegoat for the spread of the virus, which has already caused about 27,000 deaths in the US, with forecasts worsening significantly, is also linked to the assessment of its ability to have been able to deal with the crisis. It remains a fact that the US left late in adopting measures to combat the spread of the virus and the American president, before the initial stages of contagion on US soil, underestimated the phenomenon by not taking into account the appeals of the doctors, a situation confirmed also by the top government expert, who said that with an early quarantine it could have had a greater containment of the infection. However Trump, despite having his own responsibilities, is not entirely wrong about the accusations against the World Health Organization; it is a fact that at the beginning of the infection, covid 19 was described as little more than an influence, denoting evident evaluation limits of the phenomenon. The other major accused is China, which is responsible, according to Trump, for retranslating the containment measures of the virus. In fact, according to some journalistic research by the Associated Press, there is evidence that the Chinese authorities, despite knowing the dangers of the infection, would have allowed the displacement of a large quantity of people for the Lunar New Year holidays. The impression is that both leaders of the two great powers have underestimated the danger of a pandemic for economic reasons, that is, in order not to block their respective economies, without adopting a more forward-looking attitude, which would have effectively contained costs in human lives. and financial. Both capitals cannot recognize this mistake, but while China has adopted a more collaborative profile with other countries and international institutions, Trump, worried by the electoral competition, must demonstrate a more muscular and decision-making attitude. The decision to cut the American contribution to the World Health Organization, which amounts to about 10% of the total, equal to 400 million dollars a year, responds to this logic. This provision has a functional logic only for Trump's electoral aims, because it risks, in a globalized world, to reduce the role of prevention of the World Health Organization, with evident repercussions also for the United States. In addition to this strategy, the White House adds to China's guilt, the virus has been repeatedly defined by Trump as the Chinese virus, which is, however, alternated with the recognition of Beijing's contrasting action, through the adoption of rigid measures. It is a twofold behavior for the benefit of the internal electorate and the maintenance of relations with the Chinese state. As regards the internal aspect, the US is suffering from the pandemic for the loss of millions of jobs and for economic damage of several billion dollars. A weakened economy is just the opposite of the situation with which Trump wanted to face the election campaign and this provoked the confrontation with the governors of the federal states. In fact, if at local level, it is preferred to adopt the continuation of the pandemic containment strategy by blocking activities, at the central level the White House is pushing for a recovery of activities imposed from above, giving way to an institutional confrontation. The governors have in fact called Trump's behavior dictatorial, which is also seen against the country's medical authorities, who have invited not to loosen the precautionary measures for the next few days and have expressed favor for a gradual resumption of activities, which will leave unchanged the the use of individual protection devices, precisely so as not to fall back into an even greater number of infections, which would also cause a further delayed economic departure.