'Urgent action needed to curb COVID spread': Joe Biden seeks 'immediate federal' response

As the United States hit more than 100,000 new cases of the novel coronavirus for more than a week straight, with death toll above 238,000, US President-elect Joe Biden said that the malignant virus surge wave demanded “robust and immediate federal response which has been woefully lacking”. On November 13, the former Vice President said in a statement on Twitter that the nationwide crisis is showing no signs of a slowdown and needed an immediate response by the current administration. Biden added that he can only take over those responsibilities by next year, January 2021. 

“I am the president-elect, but will not be president until next year. COVID-19 does not respect dates on the calendar, it is accelerating right now. Urgent action is needed today, now, by the current administration,” Biden said in a tweet.

US President-elect added that he was “alarmed by the surge in reported COVID-19 infections, hospitalizations, and fatalities.” “This crisis demands a robust and immediate federal response which has been woefully lacking,” Biden asserted, pressing on the need to act as the caseload as predicted could double in weeks ahead under Trump’s administration, the director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Anthony Fauci warned. 

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Spreading in uncontrolled fashion

As of November 13, several states across the US registered record cases with 2,600 new cases in Illinois, 10,800 in Texas, and 7,000 in Wisconsin, with COVID-related fatalities reaching an average of more than 930 a day. “The virus is spreading in a largely uncontrolled fashion across the vast majority of the country,” Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious-disease expert at Vanderbilt University warned, adding, the hospitals were stretched to maximum capacity in Utah, according to sources of AP.

Wisconsin’s Democratic Gov. Tony Evers said at an unusual prime-time address that it was urgent for the residents now to work remotely, wear face masks and limit the assembly. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, ordered bars and restaurants to shutter at 10 p.m. sharp and avoid gathering. Meanwhile, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, said she’d mandate the masks for indoor gatherings of 25 or more people.

Warning people about the rapid spread across the top half of the country, the US White House Task Force announced a significant deterioration in the Sunbelt from the fast accelerating coronavirus transmission. “Stay indoors. There is continued, accelerating community spread,” the Task Force issued a statement. Meanwhile, as many as 65,368 people were hospitalized in the US, up from the record of the previous 61,964.

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