The American people can be comforted
Basic data on COVID-19 impact on the U.S., Nov. 14, 2020:
Cases: 10.9 million; Nov. 14: 159,021, +80% (two-week change.)
Deaths: 245,460, Nov. 14: 1,210 +38% (two-week change.)
Hospitalized: (on Nov. 14) 69,455 +43% (two-week change.)
Rose Garden remarks of emergent, post-election president, Nov. 13, 2020.
TRUMP: This is a very successful, amazing vaccine at 90 percent and more. But — so, the governor, Governor Cuomo, will have to let us know when he’s ready for it. Otherwise, we — we can’t — we can’t be delivering it to a state that won’t be giving it to its people immediately. And I know many — I know the people of New York very well. I know they want it.
So the governor will let us know when he’s ready. He’s had some very bad editorials recently about this — this statement and what’s happened with respect to nursing homes and his handling of nursing homes, and I hope he doesn’t handle this as badly as he’s handled the nursing homes.
But we’re ready to provide it as soon as they let us know that they’ll actually use it. And again, it’s a very safe and a great vaccine….Every American who needed a ventilator has had access to a ventilator. Think of that. A very complicated piece of equipment. Very expensive. And we haven’t had one person in this whole country that has requested or needed a ventilator that hasn’t had it. Every single request has been immediately filled. So that was something. That was a great job…
And now we’re helping the rest of the world with ventilators, because it’s a very hard thing. We’re producing them, thousands of — thousands of ventilators a month.
The federal government has 22,000 beds immediately available for states and jurisdictions that need additional capacity, but we think that it’s going to start going down, possibly very quickly. We’ll see what happens. But with the vaccine, it’ll — you’ll see numbers going down within a matter of months, and they’ll go down very rapidly.
Our jobs records are incredible. The job numbers are incredible. In the last six months, we’ve created over 13 million jobs and slashed the unemployment rate by more than half….
While healthy Americans have gone back to work and to school, we continue to spare no expense to protect the elderly and the vulnerable. According to some estimates, a national lockdown costs $50 billion a day and hundreds of thousands of jobs every single day.
Ideally, we won’t go to a lockdown. I will not go — this administration will not be going to a lockdown. Hopefully, the — the — whatever happens in the future — who knows which administration it will be? I guess time will tell. But I can tell you, this administration will not go to a lockdown. There won’t be necessity. Lockdowns cost lives, and they cost a lot of problems.
The cure cannot be — you got to remember — cannot be worse than the problem itself, and I’ve said it many times. And when you look at what happens during a lockdown — I just say it very loudly — it’s horrible what happens with drugs, alcohol, depression, loss of jobs, business closures. It’s a terrible thing
Alex please…
ALEX: This process has been driven solely by science and data. So it’s a shame that some — one example being the Governor of New York — have actually injected politics into the process and suggested the possibility of intentionally delaying access to an FDA-authorized vaccine, which is simply unconscionable.
TRUMP: Mike Pence, please.
MIKE: Thank you, Mr. President. And on behalf of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, I was grateful to just have a few minutes today to commend the team of Operation Warp Speed.
It was your vision that we could harness the ingenuity and the creativity of America’s greatest pharmaceutical and research companies to speed, in record time, a vaccine that would save American lives.
And as you’ve articulated here, Mr. President, the American people can be comforted with all the news this week that help is on the way.