President Donald Trump agreed not to impose a quarantine on New York after “very intensive discussions,” one of America’s top health offiicals said.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said a quarantine on New York and parts of New Jersey and Connecticut over the CCP virus would create a complex situation.
“After discussions with the President we made it clear and he agreed, it would be much better to do what’s called a strong advisory. The reason for that is you don’t want to get to the point that you’re enforcing things that would create a bigger difficulty, morale and otherwise, when you could probably accomplish the same goal,” Fauci said during an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday.
Federal officials instead issued a travel advisory urging people in the New York area, where more than half of the country’s new COVID-19 cases are appearing, not to travel for two weeks.
“What you don’t want is people traveling from that area to other areas of the country and inadvertently and innocently infecting other individuals,” Fauci said. “We felt the better way to do this would be an advisory as opposed to a very strict quarantine. And the President agreed, and that’s why he made that determination last night.”
The Epoch Times refers to the novel coronavirus, which causes the COVID-19 disease, as the CCP virus because the Chinese Communist Party’s coverup and mismanagement allowed the virus to spread throughout China before it was transmitted worldwide.
Trump told reporters in Washington on Sunday that he “looked at it as a possibility because a lot of our professionals recommended quarantine.”
“Professionals loved the idea of doing that because that’s sort of the ultimate in distancing. They didn’t want New Yorkers, where they’re having a problem, going down to Florida, where they have less of a problem,” he said. “I thought it was too much to do because the people are doing a great job with it. Also it’s very hard to enforce.”
Trump first floated the “enforceable” quarantine on Saturday morning, telling reporters that some people want to see New York isolated and that he was mulling doing so for a short time, around two weeks.
The president cited the number of New Yorkers flying to Florida, where Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a mandatory quarantine for people from New York or New Jersey arriving at airports because of the “thousands” who fled stay-at-home orders.
At the White House on Friday, Trump said he hears “constantly about people leaving New York and going to Florida.”
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy said he spoke with Trump on Friday but a quarantine didn’t come up.
“There’s no question the greater New York metropolitan area is the number one hotspot in America right now,” Murphy told reporters at a press conference.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo pushed back on the idea of a quarantine, claiming such a move would amount to “a federal declaration of war.”
“If you start walling off areas all across the country, it would be totally bizarre, counterproductive, anti-American, anti-social,” Cuomo said during an appearance on CNN.
The travel advisory gives Murphy, Cuomo, and Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont full discretion on implementation.
