Dr. Rick Bright, the HHS whistleblower, told lawmakers the exact moment that he knew the U.S.’s response to the coronavirus pandemic was doomed.
During his testimony today before the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on Health, Bright recalled a conversation he had with Mike Bowen, a Texas-based surgical mask maker.
‘Congressman I’ll never forget the emails I received from Mike Bowen indicating that our mask supplier, N95 respirator supplier, was completely decimated and he said “we’re in deep shit, the world is, and we need to act,”‘ Bright recalled. ‘And I pushed that forward to the highest levels I could in HHS and got no respsonse.’
‘From that moment I knew that we were going to have a crisis for our healthcare workers because we were not taking action,’ Bright continued. ‘We were already behind the ball, that was our last opportunity to turn on that production to save the lives of our healthcare workers and we didn’t act.’
Bowen, who testified before the same committee after Bright today, confirmed the doctor’s story.
Bright primarily testified today about his demotion, which he believed was politically motivated. In the early parts of his testimony he pilloried the government’s coronavirus response, complaining that the slowed response ‘put lives at risk.’
‘Without better planning 2020 could be the darkest winter in modern history,’ Bright warned.
‘The window is closing to address this pandemic, because we still do not have a standard, centralized, coordinated plan to take our nation through this response,’ he explained, when questioned about his dire warning.
Bright said he feared the mix of influenza cases and COVID-19 cases had the potential to overwhelm the American healthcare system come fall.
‘We can devise a comprehensive strategy,’ he told lawmakers. ‘But time is running out because the virus is still spreading everywhere.’
‘People are getting restless to leave their homes and we have to make critical decisions on how to balance the economy and science,’ he added.
Bright arrived on Capitol Hill Thursday morning, wearing gloves and a mask, to testify on Capitol Hill, on the heels of President Donald Trump calling him a ‘disgruntled employee.’
Bright, Trump said, ‘should no longer be working for our government!’
Meanwhile, Trump did not wear a mask during a visit to a medical supply factory in Pennsylvania, marking the second time he wasn’t pictured with a facial covering as he traveled outside of the White House to visit companies helping the battle against the coronavirus.
Trump and officials accompanying him were led around the Owens & Minor Inc. factory, a medical distribution facility that has sent millions of N95 masks and other protective gear to hospitals and health care workers across the country, by factory leaders who wore masks.
Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows did not wear masks while everyone else did.
Trump complained the Obama administration left him ill equipped to deal with the coronavirus pandemic.
‘The cupboards were bare,’ he said.
That claim is not true.
He also got a hit in at former vice president Joe Biden, who is the presumptive Democratic nominee.
He attacked Biden’s role leading the Obama administration’s response to the N1H1 epidemic, better known as the swine flu.
‘Most of the N95 were distributed during the N1H1 — now you know who says that right? Who says N1H1? Sleepy Joe Biden,’ Trump said.
There was scattered laughter among the factory workers.
Trump spoke in a massive warehouse, with wire shelves piled high all the way to the top with medical and cleaning supplies in cardboard boxes of varying sizes.
There was a giant American flag hanging down from the framework at the roof at one end of the building.
Pennsylvania is a state crucial to the president’s re-election.
He narrowly won it in 2016.
Bright, a career official, alleges he was removed as head of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority after repeatedly warning higher-ups the virus outbreak was going to be worse than the public was being led to believe.
He said the breaking point came when he opposed a White House directive to allow widespread access to hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug Trump was touting as an effective treatment.
The FDA recently warned against its use for COVID-19, except in limited circumstances. But at the White House on Thursday, the president was still bullish. “We’ve had tremendous response to the hydroxy,” Trump said. “So, a lot of people have sworn by it, and we’ll see.”
Republican lawmakers for the most part were careful not to attack Bright directly.
Bright, who has a doctoral degree in immunology, said the nation’s path forward should be based on science. The steps include:
— Establishing a national testing strategy. The White House has urged states to take the lead on testing, even as the federal government pushes to make more tests and better ones widely available. Trump says the U.S. has “prevailed” on testing through this strategy, but in Congress Democrats are demanding a federal framework to encompass the whole nation.
— Doubling down on educating the public about basic safety measures such as frequent hand-washing and wearing masks in public places. “Frankly, our leaders must lead by modeling the behavior,” said Bright, in a not-too-subtle reference to a president who conspicuously goes maskless.
— Setting up a system to fairly distribute equipment and supplies that are scarce and highly sought. Eliminating state vs. state competition would increase efficiency and reduce costs.