Thursday, February 6, 2020

Cases continue to soare with 28,018/563. Another packed day mostly at HHS and White House. Conspiracy theories still abound. The NAS group with OSTP met (see above) and decided that there was no clear evidence of malfeasance, but it should be looked into (see attachement below): NASEM Response to OSTP re Coronavi Briefed the Asia/East Asia Ambassadors on nCoV in Room EEOB-350. Then had long meeting of Coronavirus Task Force is Sit Room of WH chaired by Mick Mulvany at 4:00- 4:45PM when the core group of Task Force were called to Oval Office to brief POTUS. When we walked in the POTUS was not yet in the room. When he walked in with Melania, the first thing he did was say“"Anthony, come here and say hello to Melania”. Then, to my embarrassment in front of everyone (Kellyanne, Mick, Bob O’Brien and many in Cabinet) he told Melania that I was the smartest person in the world. We then sat down and briefed him and Melania. He asked what he could do and we said that since he would be calling Chinese President Xi Jinping late this evening, he could ask him to approve the WHO delegation of scientists that include CDC and NIH people. He did what he did last time and directed most of the questions to me, again ending with asking me if I thought that we were on the right track. During the task Force meeting, the issues came up of cruise ships (one in Yokohama, Japan, and one in New Jersey/New York) that had infected Chinese from Wuhan on them and discussion of how to handle quarantine for the rest of the passengers. PRESS: India TV; Podcast with Newt Gingrich; Podcast with Howard Buchner at JAMA (well-received by NYT and WSJ reporters.