Members of the Coronavirus Task Force shared several updates Wednesday morning during its daily press briefing in the White House.
The following are the highlights from that briefing:
-President Donald Trump is invoking and will sign the Defense Production Act. The act is a United States federal law enacted on September 8, 1950, in response to the start of the Korean War, according to the Congressional Research Service. It was part of a broad civil defense and war mobilization effort in the context of the Cold War. Trump said this act will allow the federal government “to sign contracts or fulfill orders deemed necessary for national defense”, in this instance, emergency medical supplies like ventilators and protective gear for medical staff.
-Trump said FEMA National Response Coordination Center has been activated, through the Stafford Act, in all regions and are at Level 1 (the highest level). The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Stafford Act) is a 1988 amended version of the Disaster Relief Act of 1974 and created the system in place today by which a presidential disaster declaration or an emergency declaration triggers financial and physical assistance through FEMA, according to the New America Foundation. The Act gives FEMA the responsibility for coordinating government-wide relief efforts. The Federal Response Plan includes contributions from 28 federal agencies and non-governmental organizations, such as the American Red Cross.
-The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is suspending all foreclosures and evictions until the end of April.
-Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, said there are “very concerning” reports from Italy and France of young people with COVID-19 “getting seriously ill.”
-Trump said Mercy and Comfort, “two massive hospital ships” will be docking in New York and California.
-Self-swabbing testing is being looked at.
-Trump said asylum seekers will be denied entry at the Mexico border and that Canada and the United States have agreed to close the U.S./Canadian border to nonessential travel.
You can watch the media briefing in its entirety below starting at the 1:20:37