[jennasys]

While the states may be responsible for what happens on the ground, it is certainly the role of the federal government to provide coordination in the case of a nationwide public health issue. Clearly, that was not done in this case. The CDC, NIH, FEMA, and the surgeon general should have all been playing a role in this pandemic. The states shouldn't have had to ultimately go about creating their own regional coalitions of their own accord out of desperation.

[rayiner]

The CDC issued guidelines, and Trump had regular calls with the governors to coordinate. It’s more or less the same thing Merkel’s government did. They delivered what federal stockpiles they had. What else were they supposed to do? It’s the states fault that there weren’t any test kits, tracing and isolation infrastructure, etc. Obviously it would have helped if Trump wasn’t a counterproductive buffoon that contradicted the guidelines his own administration was issuing, but I’m not really talking about Trump’s failings as a leader. My post is about the division of labor.

[mynameisvlad]

> It’s the states fault that there weren’t any test kits, tracing and isolation infrastructure, etc.

Why exactly is this the states' fault? This seems like something that would be far more effective at the federal level. It's the exact same argument as the parent comment, it shouldn't be up to states to create tracing and isolation infrastructure, test kits, etc.

Putting that burden on the states is exactly how we got to the place we are in. Without effective federal support and direction, no solution will be effective since inter-state travel exists and there's 50 different states that will come up with 50 different solutions, some more effective than others.

It makes zero sense to force states to individually do all this when a single entity would be far more effective.

[rayiner]

> Why exactly is this the states' fault?

Because it was their responsibility. The CDC, as well as about 235 years of law, was absolutely clear about this: https://www.cdc.gov/phlp/docs/phl101/PHL101-Unit-5-16Jan09-S... (slides 8, 10).

> This seems like something that would be far more effective at the federal level.

Maybe that’s a discussion we can have for next time. But the point is that we had a very long-standing division of labor that states knew about, but they didn’t prepare. You can’t have a debate about changing the division of responsibility during a pandemic. The idea that someone else should have been in charge isn’t an excuse when the responsibility had been assigned to you. Put differently, the CDC presentation I linked to, which says the CDC is just there to provide “expert assistance” wasn’t a surprise to anyone.

> It's the exact same argument as the parent comment, it shouldn't be up to states to create tracing and isolation infrastructure, test kits, etc.

But it was. Just like it was up to France or Germany to do those things, and not some EU agency. Italy isn’t blaming the eCDC for its own lack of preparation.

> Putting that burden on the states is exactly how we got to the place we are in.

No, we got into the place we’re in because states shirked a responsibility that had plainly been assigned to them. (And in fact, was inherently theirs as a matter of the very structure of our federation).

> Without effective federal support and direction, no solution will be effective since inter-state travel exists and there's 50 different states that will come up with 50 different solutions, some more effective than others.

Canada, Australia, Germany, etc. all managed to do this just fine.

[mynameisvlad]

> Canada, Australia, Germany, etc. all managed to do this just fine.

You mean countries with federal-led and coordinated responses? I wonder why they did just fine. Maybe it was the leadership and support that the US so desperately lacks.

https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/emergency-pr...

https://www.health.gov.au/news/health-alerts/novel-coronavir... and https://www.health.gov.au/committees-and-groups/australian-h...

https://www.bundesregierung.de/resource/blob/973812/1753872/...

The states/provinces within may have been the primary ones managing in certain cases, like Australia, but the entire response in all three countries is federally led and centralized through committees and support from the federal governments. In fact, one of the key parts of Australia's response is specifically

> ensure the response is consistent and integrated across the country