The American people have every right to be nervous regarding the COVID-19 strain of coronavirus that is currently spreading throughout the world.
The numbers are staggering, with over 2,800 dead and tens of thousands of others infected, making for some fairly terrified global citizens. Furthermore, in this age of airplanes touching down in several different cities each day, and cruise ships docking in several ports a week, a virus as contagious as this one tends to make the rounds.
Even more troubling still is the fourteen day incubation period maintained by the illness that makes staying ahead of the virus all the more difficult.
This is why a recent whistleblower complaint fielded by the federal government is so worrisome.
The U.S. government on Sunday said it was investigating complaints that federal workers were not given proper protective gear and training before greeting U.S. citizens evacuated from a cruise ship that had 691 people infected with the new coronavirus.
U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar told CBS’s “Face the Nation” he was personally involved in the probe, and the government was determined to make sure its workers were kept safe.
Azar told CBS it had been 14 days since any HHS worker had contact with the evacuees from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, and none had contracted the disease.
About 70 cases have been reported in the United States, including 47 cases among people repatriated from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the supposed epicenter of the outbreak, or from the Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined in Japan.
Cruise ships are already notorious for their ability to allow sickness to blossom, and when combined with the aforementioned traits of this strain of coronavirus, the results could be downright dumbfounding.
