When The Cure Is Worse Than The Disease

Last week initial jobless claims in the U.S. surged to more 6.6 million. The number is more than double the 3.1 million job-loss's economists expected, and roughly ten times more than the highest number of weekly claims during the Great Recession in 2008 (see above).

More than a week before, President Trump warned of the devastating effect severe quarantine measures would have on the economy.

The tweet ignited a fierce debate within the medical community. On one-side was the nation's top infectious-diseases expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who said we could "relax social distancing" once there's "no new cases, no deaths." On the other side were doctors like David Katz, who argued in the New York Times, that a more targeted approach, like quarantining the at-risk, and letting the rest of society return to "normal" would be more effective.

Shockingly, and I mean shockingly, Trump chose to contradict his own past statements and side with Fauci. On March 29th, Trump extended federal social distancing guidelines through the end of April. On March 31st, he warned the U.S. is facing a "very, very painful two weeks." The stock market tanked more than 1,000 points the next day.

"Three weeks like we've never seen before," said Trump. “When you look at night, the kind of death that has been caused by this invisible enemy, it’s incredible.”

Yet just a few weeks prior Trump seemed to be in the "just the flu" camp and wanted things to return to normal by Easter, calling it "a beautiful time."

If you've been following the President, then you know the norm is for Trump to intuit, and then to stand by that intuition until the bitter end. Whether it's "Russia Collusion" or claiming Obama was born in Kenya, Trump doesn't back down and he doesn't reverse course. Yet he has here. It's so un-Trump.

Frankly, I side with the President's initial intuition. The question to ask ourselves is this: Will the millions of people who have had their businesses destroyed, jobs lost, and can no longer pay their bills look back at the quarantine measures and say "the government saved my life."

I don't think so. And honestly, I don't think the President does either. There must be something more going on here for the President to back down from his initial stance. I'm just not sure what it is.