Former CDC chief has a plan for a return to normal

Speaking on Fox News on Saturday, former CDC chief Tom Frieden has a plan to get the nation up and running as soon as possible.

Fox News reports, “Box it in. That’s the basic concept here. Box in COVID,” Frieden said. He then outlined the four corners of the box that he said will keep the new coronavirus ‘at bay.’

“He said the four corners of the box include testing widely, isolating safely, contact tracing completely and quarantining comfortably. If we can do those four things we’ll be able to come out much sooner and much more safely. But we have to do them very well or we’re stuck either staying home longer or coming out, it explodes again and we have to come back in again.”

Frieden concluded, “People have understood flattening the curve. We’re staying at home so that the health care system is not so terribly overwhelmed, as is happening now in New York City and elsewhere. So we can strengthen our systems so that when we come out again it doesn’t explode again. It’s not a question of the date, it’s a question of the data. How hard we work now, how fast we work now, that will determine how soon and safely we open.”

He also expressed confidence in the president’s team, “They know how to do this. This is core public health. This is what we do for tuberculosis and other diseases.”

This non-partisan approach could work and let steam out of the growing feeling amongst Americans that the nation must get back to work and return to a semblance of normal everyday living.

It also rebuts the message coming from some governors that nothing will go back to normal until a vaccine is found and deployed. It will be treatment and the steps above, not a vaccine that will not be ready for some time, that is the key to winning this public health fight.