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Can Congress vote to provide emergency funding to the CDC to make up for the cuts?

bilekas 7y ago
Not to go too off topic and political but could you see any republicans going up in direct contrast to Trump saying : 'all is under control' ? I certainly cant. And as shameful and sad as it sounds, until people start dying.. I don't see much movement on this.
- gnulinux 7y ago
  It's going to be very late once people start dying. COVID-19 takes about 2 weeks to develop severe pneumonia. Once dozens of people start dying, assuming 1% fatality, there would be thousands of patients 2 weeks ago, spreading exponentially.
Ididntdothis 7y ago
You can’t just spin up this capability quickly once it has been lost. There is lot of experience needed
davidw 7y ago
Maybe, but it's probably not like, say, ditch digging, where you round up some people with strong backs and hand them shovels and get to work. Probably takes time to ramp up. The time to do that was a few months back.
acdha 7y ago
Put this in a more familiar context: say the CDC had just been rooted by a bunch of hackers. How much time would it take for Congress to cut a check versus setting up the organization structure, hiring highly-skilled in-demand people, getting them on-board and trained up with the environment, and letting them learn enough about the systems to start hardening them, etc.? This kind of capacity takes years to develop even if you can cut it quickly.
dragonwriter 7y ago
No, for reasons very similar to those which The Mythical Man-Month explains often prevent throwing more resources at a late software project.
- FillardMillmore 7y ago
  Thanks for all the responses everyone - I understood this concept but failed to apply it here (where it most certainly does apply). Dont know if anyone is still keeping tabs on this thread, but apparently Trump's "CDC budget cuts" are a falsehood. He proposed cuts but was overruled by congress. In fact, CDC received an increase in funding. See the following link: https://apnews.com/49de80242dd8b58bd34af7cb19f1323a https://apnews.com/49de80242dd8b58bd34af7cb19f1323a > MIKE BLOOMBERG: “There’s nobody here to figure out what the hell we should be doing. And he’s defunded — he’s defunded Centers for Disease Control, CDC, so we don’t have the organization we need. This is a very serious thing.” — Democratic presidential debate Tuesday. JOE BIDEN, comparing the Obama-Biden administration with now: “We increased the budget of the CDC. We increased the NIH budget. ... He’s wiped all that out. ... He cut the funding for the entire effort.” THE FACTS: They’re both wrong to say the agencies have seen their money cut. Bloomberg is repeating the false allegation in a new ad that states the U.S. is unprepared for the virus because of “reckless cuts” to the CDC. Trump’s budgets have proposed cuts to public health, only to be overruled by Congress, where there’s strong bipartisan support for agencies such as the CDC and NIH. Instead, financing has increased.

Not to go too off topic and political but could you see any republicans going up in direct contrast to Trump saying : 'all is under control' ? I certainly cant. And as shameful and sad as it sounds, until people start dying.. I don't see much movement on this.

gnulinux 7y ago
It's going to be very late once people start dying. COVID-19 takes about 2 weeks to develop severe pneumonia. Once dozens of people start dying, assuming 1% fatality, there would be thousands of patients 2 weeks ago, spreading exponentially.

Ididntdothis 7y ago

You can’t just spin up this capability quickly once it has been lost. There is lot of experience needed

davidw 7y ago

Maybe, but it's probably not like, say, ditch digging, where you round up some people with strong backs and hand them shovels and get to work. Probably takes time to ramp up. The time to do that was a few months back.

acdha 7y ago

Put this in a more familiar context: say the CDC had just been rooted by a bunch of hackers. How much time would it take for Congress to cut a check versus setting up the organization structure, hiring highly-skilled in-demand people, getting them on-board and trained up with the environment, and letting them learn enough about the systems to start hardening them, etc.? This kind of capacity takes years to develop even if you can cut it quickly.

dragonwriter 7y ago

No, for reasons very similar to those which The Mythical Man-Month explains often prevent throwing more resources at a late software project.

FillardMillmore 7y ago
Thanks for all the responses everyone - I understood this concept but failed to apply it here (where it most certainly does apply). Dont know if anyone is still keeping tabs on this thread, but apparently Trump's "CDC budget cuts" are a falsehood. He proposed cuts but was overruled by congress. In fact, CDC received an increase in funding. See the following link: https://apnews.com/49de80242dd8b58bd34af7cb19f1323a https://apnews.com/49de80242dd8b58bd34af7cb19f1323a > MIKE BLOOMBERG: “There’s nobody here to figure out what the hell we should be doing. And he’s defunded — he’s defunded Centers for Disease Control, CDC, so we don’t have the organization we need. This is a very serious thing.” — Democratic presidential debate Tuesday. JOE BIDEN, comparing the Obama-Biden administration with now: “We increased the budget of the CDC. We increased the NIH budget. ... He’s wiped all that out. ... He cut the funding for the entire effort.” THE FACTS: They’re both wrong to say the agencies have seen their money cut. Bloomberg is repeating the false allegation in a new ad that states the U.S. is unprepared for the virus because of “reckless cuts” to the CDC. Trump’s budgets have proposed cuts to public health, only to be overruled by Congress, where there’s strong bipartisan support for agencies such as the CDC and NIH. Instead, financing has increased.