As the number of cases of COVID-19, also known informally as coronavirus, grows in the United States, local, state and federal government officials are scrambling to contain the spread of the disease and “flatten the curve,” an expression that roughly means to reduce the outbreak of COVID-19 cases to a more manageable rate.
While millions of Americans have been ordered to stay home, employees deemed “essential” such as grocery store clerks plow on; tired but perseverant. Unemployment claims have skyrocketed in the last few weeks, shattering records from previous economic downturns, and many industries have been shuttered due to the need for social distancing.
With all the dispiriting news, an underreported story has been how private industry has geared up to manufacture and distribute essential products to fight the spread of the virus. Working often in cooperation with federal and state agencies, many companies have put the American people ahead of their own profit margin and pitched in as they had during other times of national emergency.
According to Fox News, tech giant Apple is donating 10 million masks to American health care workers. The Dallas Morning News reports that Neiman Marcus, a department store chain, and Joann, the craft store chain, is also diverting resources to sew health care workers’ gowns, masks, and scrubs. Forbes reports Major League Baseball has partnered with Fanatics, the company that makes the jerseys the players wear, to do the same with the baseball season currently on hold. According to the Wall Street Journal, Governor Charlie Baker of Massachusetts managed to enlist the help of the New England Patriots’ team plane in securing millions of masks to be shipped from China. Brooks Brothers is also producing masks and gowns in their factories, and Crocs is donating shoes to healthcare workers.
Private sector firms are contributing more than just supplies and raw materials, though. According to Forbes, a biotech firm based out of Massachusetts called Moderna has managed to launch clinical trials for a possible COVID-19 vaccine. Forbes goes on to report that antiviral treatments are being tested by Gilead Sciences while the Food and Drug Administration has approved recently developed testing methods. American automobile companies are also manufacturing ventilators to assist COVID-19 treatment. While the work of health care professionals is far from done, steps are being made to contain the disease.
President Trump openly speculated about a possible reopening of businesses on Easter Sunday (April 12th), but with cases of COVID-19 continuing to spread at an alarming rate, the president has since backtracked and called for social distancing protocols to extend at least until April 30, with the Surgeon General speculating that those guidelines could be extended further. Many states have ordered residents to stay at home, with the only exceptions being to buy essential items and to exercise.
While the fight to contain COVID-19 is far from over in the United States, Europe, and Asia, it is heartening to know that significant resources in both the public and private sector are being mobilized to provide reinforcements to the exhausted medical professionals on the front lines of this pandemic. There will be lessons to learn after COVID-19 is contained and eventually cured, and it will be prudent for both public and private sectors to proactively prepare for the possibility of another disease with similar effects. There’s even the possibility of COVID-19 returning as the weather cools down in autumn and winter, a threat that must be taken seriously. Today, both private and public sectors are making significant sacrifices, and that should be a sign that people can use this shared experience toward greater unity and cooperation.
