Analysis & Opinions - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Coronavirus: Juliette Kayyem on Lessons from Ebola

| Feb. 24, 2020

Juliette Kayyem, Faculty Chair of the Belfer Center’s Security and Global Health Project, has been providing real-time perspective on the coronavirus on Twitter. Read her recent comments below.

As the ability to contain #coronavirus #COVID2019 becomes unsustainable, the discussion will turn to countermeasures to protect populations and curb the spread of the disease. So, it's time to discuss what we should expect/demand from #homelandsecurity 1/https://t.co/dm3ikVfTyN
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

You should be following @RonaldKlain, the "Ebola czar", for concerns related to the failures to designate lead person and the dangerous (lack of) decisionmaking process that is not based on medicine and has Trump publicly criticizing. For example: https://t.co/EPCLquad4d 2/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

As I've said before, a functioning WH should be the "brains" of any crisis -- setting priorities based on expert advice, working with international community, steering money, and settling differences amongst agencies. This is role Ron served during Ebola. 3/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

But once the "brains" decide, stuff needs to get done. That's the "muscle" of a crisis response, those of us who manage incident commands to get the priorities done. And to date, there is little to speak of on that even though we have had some time. 4/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

It's not easy. US is a homeland like no other: 50 states, countless cities, territories and tribes (SLTT) each with their governance systems; a Constitution that respects state rights, especially in public safety/public health; and a (stated) commitment to individual liberty. 5/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

In other words, it is fair to say we were built unsafe; it's ok, by design, it's just what we work with. So that means that the "muscles" of countermeasures, as decided by a WH, get operationalized through a complicated network of governance systems of SLTT. 6/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

I know something about this having been both a HS advisor for a state and an Assistant Secretary for Intergovernmental (SLTT) at DHS. And so here is the planning we'd want to see based on those "muscle" experiences, and H1N1. (I also have 3 kids so I get it) 7/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

What countermeasures should SLTT be implementing now, if any, and what do they need to operationalize them; what standards for school closings and how will they be enforced/how long; what is being communicated to public health/safety professionals and the public; 8/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

Will major events be cancelled and what are the standards for doing so; what sort of variances amongst these governance systems (border states/urban areas) will be allowed; if a vaccine is made, what is the order for distribution (the hardest ? we faced with H1N1). 9/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

For CBP and TSA agents that work the border, what additional countermeasures will be in place (they have kids too!); what can be done to stop racial profiling/ethnic bias that will be inevitable; how can we stop price gauging and the inevitable fraud that will occur?
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

There are more and NONE OF THIS IS NEW even if the virus is. That's the point; panic is a result of a public believing there is no plan. The WH could go far to alleviating that by doing two relatively easy operational things (plus getting a lead czar/incident commander). 10/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

First, who is communicating to the public about risk. Again, "pandemic" does not speak of lethality or severity; it is a word to describe a new virus that has global reach. Coranovirus is bad, but it's worse for certain populations (H1N1 killed kids, #COVID unclear). 11/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

Second, we did this for H1N1, is the WH/DHS/HHS having daily 50 state calls to prepare our communities. Daily. Mapping out what is being seen, and letting the political beast (nervous governors, panicky mayors) access what is inevitably going to be political.12/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

I haven't heard planning -- we still have time -- for these relatively simple measures and they worked well for the muscle side of H1N1 and others, in showing transparency, and coordinating a complicated constitutional architecture. 13/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

Anyway, I know you are all going to say this WH is a mess, the President can't handle it, etc., and for the life of me I don't know how they couldn't have coordinated these simple governance plans with the weeks that we have had. 14/
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

China's isolation moves bought us time, but from all accounts, they only did that; containment was limited. So now we go to defense. The systems are there to guide a response through a homeland that is, like I said, quite like no other. We need to use them. 15/15
— Juliette Kayyem (@juliettekayyem) February 23, 2020

For more information on this publication: Belfer Communications Office

For Academic Citation: “Coronavirus: Juliette Kayyem on Lessons from Ebola.” Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School, February 24, 2020.