Boing Boing — Trump administration considers a centrally planned economy to deal with coronavirus

The Trump administration is reportedly considering the possibility of re-implementing the Defense Production Act. Originally enacted during the Korean War, the Act essentially empowers the President to control the means of production—the idea being that it would be in the interest of the nation's defense to force private manufacturers to focus their production efforts on things that would benefit the country in a time of tenuous resources....

"Reportedly." Rumor maybe, but interesting.

China did not really have to implement this, since it is largely the current system there, but the Chinese leadership gripped the reins tighter, basically shutting the country down. This made sense especially at the time of Chinese New Year, when the entire country "goes home" for vacation to their ancestral locations.

Boing Boing
Trump administration considers a centrally planned economy to deal with coronavirus

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Dr. Bruce Aylward, who led the 25-member team, said that in absence of a drug or vaccine which could have fought the virus, China resorted to publicly available standard health tools like case finding and contact tracing with the kind of rigor and innovation “on a scale that we have never seen in history.”...

Dr. Aylward also said that China’s response was agile and science-driven. It was said that by the time the report had been compiled, the Chinese government had updated its clinical guidance six times in total as new findings about the virus and the illness kept coming in.

Stringent measures such as sealing off towns and ordering people to stay in their homes changed the course of the outbreak, Dr. Aylward said, mentioning that the decline is now happening sooner than expected....

Dr. Aylward also noted that the world is not ready to tackle the epidemic yet, but with the model that China has produced, the process can be sped up. He urged countries on the brink of the epidemic to take up tough and aggressive programs, mentioning that key steps could be planning for the heavy demand on hospitals, providing respiratory support such as ventilators and deployment of staff for contact tracing....

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