India: The perils of an all-out lockdown

Jean Drèze

As the novel coronavirus spreads, a double crisis looms over India: a health crisis and an economic crisis. In terms of casualties, the health crisis is still very confined (seven deaths in a country where eight million people die every year), but the numbers are growing fast. Meanwhile, the economic crisis is hitting with full force, throwing millions out of work by the day. Unlike the health crisis, it is not class-neutral, but hurts poor people the most.

India slows down

Migrant workers, street vendors, contract workers, almost everyone in the informal sector — the bulk of the workforce — is being hit by this economic tsunami. In Maharashtra, mass lay-offs have forced migrant workers to rush home, some without being paid. Many of them are now stranded between Maharashtra and their homes as trains have been cancelled. The economic standstill in Maharashtra is spreading fast to other States as factories, shops, offices and worksites close with little hope of an early return to normalcy. With transport routes dislocated, even the coming wheat harvest, a critical source of survival for millions of labouring families in north India, may not bring much relief. And all this is just a trailer.

This economic crisis calls for urgent, massive relief measures. Lockdowns may be needed to slow down the epidemic, but poor people cannot afford to stay idle at home. If they are asked to stay home, they will need help. There is a critical difference, in this respect, between India and affluent countries with a good social security system. The average household in, say, Canada or Italy can take a lockdown in its stride (for some time at least), but the staying power of the Indian poor is virtually nil.

Tap social schemes

Since time is of the essence, the first step is to make good use of existing social-security schemes to support poor people — pensions, the Public Distribution System (PDS), midday meals, and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), among others. Initial measures could include advance payment of pensions, enhanced PDS rations, immediate payment of MGNREGA wage arrears, and expanded distribution of take-home rations at schools and anganwadis. Some States have already taken useful steps of this sort, but the scale of relief measures needs radical expansion. That, in turn, requires big money from the Central government. It also requires the government to avoid squandering its resources on corporate bailouts: most crisis-affected sectors of the economy will soon be lobbying for rescue packages.

Meanwhile, there is a danger of people’s hardships being aggravated by a tendency to shut down essential services. Public transport, administrative offices, court hearings, MGNREGA projects and even immunisation drives have already been suspended to varying degrees in many States. Some of these interruptions are certainly justified, but others are likely to be counter-productive. Remember, we are dealing not only with a health crisis but also with an economic crisis. Even if discontinuing public services helps to contain the health crisis, the economic consequences need to be considered.

To assess the case for various precautionary measures, we must bear in mind the dual motive for taking precautions. When you decide to stay at home, there are two possible motives for it: a self-protection motive and a public-purpose motive. In the first case, you act out of fear of being infected. In the second, you participate in collective efforts to stop the spread of the virus.

Some people think about precautions as a matter of self-protection. What they may not realise is that the individual risk of getting infected is still tiny — so small that it is hardly worth any self-protection efforts (except for special groups such as health workers and the elderly). Four hundred thousand people die of tuberculosis in India every year, yet we take no special precautions against it. So why do we take precautions when seven people have died of COVID-19? The enlightened reason is not to protect ourselves, but to contribute to collective efforts to halt the epidemic.

Display creativity

A similar reasoning applies to the case for shutting down public services as a precautionary measure. Self-protection of public employees is not a major issue (for the time being), the main consideration is public purpose. Further, public purpose must include the possible economic consequences of a shutdown. If a service creates a major health hazard, public purpose may certainly call for it to be discontinued (this is the reason for closing schools and colleges). On the other hand, services that help poor people in their hour of need without creating a major health hazard should continue to function as far as possible. That would apply not only to health services or the Public Distribution System, but also to many other public services including administrative offices at the district and local levels. Poor people depend on these services in multiple ways, closing them across the board at this time would worsen the economic crisis without doing much to stem the health crisis.

Keeping public services going in this situation is likely to require some initiative and creativity. An explicit list of essential services (already available in some States) and official guidelines on coronavirus readiness at the workplace would be a good start. Many public premises are crying for better distancing arrangements. Some services can even be reinvented for now. For instance, anganwadis could play a vital role of public-health outreach at this time, even if children have to be kept away. Many public spaces could also be used, with due safeguards, to disseminate information or to impart good habits such as distancing and washing hands.

The urgent need for effective social security measures makes it all the more important to avoid a loss of nerve. The way things are going today, it will soon be very difficult for some State governments to run the Public Distribution System or take good care of drinking water. That would push even more people to the wall, worsening not only the economic crisis but possibly the health crisis as well. This is not the time to let India’s frail safety net unravel.

Lessons from a crisis

Melwyn Pinto

In Chinese the word ‘crisis’ apparently is spelt with two characters. The one suggests danger and the other opportunity. Such understanding of a crisis has never looked more meaningful than in the present. The current situation has driven everyone to set all priorities aside and concentrate only on the one adversary. As someone rightly said, the present situation is worse than a world war. No one is bothered about any other issue presently, including cross border terrorism and nuclear warfare. The entire world is brought to its knees by a microorganism. And yet, perhaps this situation was waiting to happen. When humanity refused to take responsibility for itself of the manifold damage it had caused to the universe, nature seems to have made use of this microorganism to reclaim its lost space.

Think of it. One of the biggest transport polluters on this earth is the aircraft. And most airlines have grounded majority of their aircrafts. It is estimated that most of them may go bankrupt in a few days, if the situation does not ease out. Pollution have come down. Wild life is breathing easy. Oceans and rivers are bubbling with the long-lost aquatic energy. While the human race is devastated, nature seems to have come to its own. It seems to be celebrating ‘life’.

Isn’t there a message for the human world? Of course, there is – especially for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. While some of the most powerful world leaders asserted that there was no global warming, it should have disturbed the collective conscience of everyone. But it did not. Now, it seems as though it does not matter. Nature is cooling down by itself, with increasing number of people across the globe beating the retreat and staying at home.

Markets all across the globe have begun to collapse. Giant business establishments are seeing a slump never seen before. The agony of the small scale businesses is even worse. It is possible that more people may die of hunger in the next few days than of coronavirus, unless the governments, especially in the poorer countries, reach out to the economically vulnerable. Unfortunately, while the administration in India has asked the people to stay indoors for over 15 days, the poor are worried how to survive. While it is important to contain the deadly virus, the government must also try and infuse confidence and hope in people that it will take care of them. Such measures are hardly there. If the administration in India does not respond proactively to the plight of the poor, it is possible that we will have another bigger crisis looming over us.

An opportunity

Perhaps this is an opportunity never encountered before; this may be the moment for all to rise as one. This may be the eureka moment for every sceptic out there. It may be a time to realise that we must slow down, we must take time out. Nothing matters now. What matters most of all is to stay alive and stay safe. This cannot be done unless we cooperate with one another. That is the most difficult lesson everyone is compelled to learn. The world has never been as united as now in fighting a common enemy

Every crisis throws a series of lessons for us to learn, which we must ignore at our own peril. What are the lessons to be learnt from the present crisis? Perhaps, nature had no other way but this one to push humanity to the brim so that it (nature) could survive. If humanity had the illusion that it was in control of its destiny, nature has also taught us that humanity can be the master of its destiny as well. There is no one to blame now but us. While nature has fought back constantly, it was never so decisive. And life seems to be possible even without all the so called mindless ‘progress’ that humans had ventured into. When the infected celebrities have no other way than be quarantined in government health facilities, their make-belief world would have crumbled. And yet, it is possible that such experience could help them to awaken to the larger miserable reality of a lot of people in the world.

However, not all hope is lost. Humanity has fought every crisis successfully in the past, and this too will be overcome. It may take a while, but the world will come out successful. The larger question, however, is will the world be the same again or different. One hopes that it will be a different world. It is hoped that the human world will strive hard to be less greedy, less polluting and less irrational adventurous. Rightly did Shakespeare say, ‘One touch of nature makes the whole world kin’. One only hopes the world will remain in this kinship even after the current crisis disappears.

Great Depression-like mass jobless queues across Australia

Mike Head

The contempt and indifference of capitalist governments toward the working class is being graphically displayed in Australia, with huge queues of jobless workers outside the government’s Centrelink welfare offices across the country.

In scenes not seen since the mass unemployment of the Great Depression of the 1930s, workers who have lost their livelihoods due to the criminally inadequate response of governments to the COVID-19 pandemic are being further exposed to unsafe and dangerous conditions as they wait for hours to try to lodge welfare claims.

Yesterday, lines of up to 200 metres snaked around entire city and suburban blocks. From 4.30 am today, well before dawn, the scenes were repeated.

As the number of officially-recorded coronavirus infections in Australia spiraled toward 2,000 today, these queues will only add to the spread, even though people in the lines tried to keep distances between each other. Unless the current rate of infection—which is quadrupling each week—is halted, the total will reach nearly six million people in six weeks.

Part of the queue outside the Centrelink office in the inner-city Sydney suburb of Leichardt

“They are treating us like cattle,” one worker said in a queue at Stones Corner in Brisbane. In fact, even cattle would not be exposed so contemptuously to the obvious danger of infection in such queues, which made a mockery of the “social distancing” measures of the federal and state governments.

Tense moods and angry incidents were reported in many locations. At Redfern in Sydney, people coming out of the Centrelink office reported irate and chaotic scenes inside. At a South Australian office, people left outside were “banging on the door—they weren’t happy,” a worker noted.

Distressed people, many of whom have never applied for welfare before, told reporters they feared losing their homes due to mortgage or rent bills they could no longer pay.

Aware of rising social discontent, the federal and state governments mobilised police and security guards to prevent unrest erupting in the queues, especially when offices close at 5 pm with thousands of people still in the lines.

Typically, the federal government of Prime Minister Scott Morrison arrogantly declared last night that workers did not need to be in the queues because they could lodge “intentions to claim” online. But the government’s MyGov website also crashed yesterday because it exceeded its capacity, said to be 55,000 claims.

According to the government, 95,000 people tried to access MyGov yesterday, about twice what it claimed to have prepared for. But that number is only a small fraction of the hundreds of thousands of workers who have suddenly lost their jobs because of the shutdowns of hospitality and other industries.

Much worse is soon to come as the shutdowns are extended to retail and other “non-essential” industries that employ millions of people. In a sign of what is to come, Michael Hill jewelers today moved to shut its 300 stores indefinitely and sack 2,500 workers.

Behind the scenes, the ruling class is discussing plans for even greater social tensions. “Senior sources” in the banking and the forecasting sectors told Nine Entertainment newspapers that their analysis showed Australia was headed for an unemployment rate of 15 percent or more.

That would mean at least two million jobless, plus many more “under-employed.” During the Great Depression, Australia’s jobless rate exceeded 30 percent, reflecting Australian capitalism’s vulnerability to global breakdowns.

Workers attempting to practice social distancing while waiting to enter Leichardt Centrelink office

The government-ordered shutdowns and related lockdowns have become necessary because of the failure of the same Liberal-National and Labor governments, and the corporate elite they serve, to implement the basic measures that have proven essential globally to curbing the pandemic: mass testing, tracking and quarantining.

Last week, World Health Organisation (WHO) director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus again warned, as the WHO has done since February, that countries are not testing enough for the virus, likening their approach to “fighting a fire blindfolded.”

For all the governments’ empty claims that its pro-business economic packages would save jobs, employers are ruthlessly laying off workers. Yesterday alone, the Woolworths-owned ALH Group—the country’s biggest pubs, pokies and hotels business—stood down some 8,000 of its 15,000 workforce.

Helloworld Travel stood down 1,300 staff and made another 275 employees redundant. Federal Group, Tasmania’s largest private employer which operates two casinos, hotels and pubs, stood down 1,500 workers.

While governments are allocating billions of dollars to bail out the banks and corporations, workers are bearing the brunt of this historic public health and economic crisis.

The Australian reported that IBISWorld data shows the closure of non-essential services, including pubs, cafes, gyms, cinemas, casinos, amusement parks and zoos, would cost about 300,000 jobs and erase $10 billion in workers’ wages.

The Morrison government initially announced that MyGov crashed because of a malicious “cyber attack.” That scare-mongering claim, like most of the federal and state governments’ messages throughout the pandemic, soon proved to be false.

The truth is that MyGov cannot cope with the demand because, once again, insufficient and unconcerned preparations were made for this human catastrophe. Desperate workers trying to get through to Centrelink by phone experienced impossible delays. Even before this crisis, as many as 55 million phone calls to the government’s Services Australia went unanswered each year.

As with the public hospitals and health services, Centrelink and other government “human services” have been gutted for years by staff and resourcing cuts, as well as the widespread privatisation or outsourcing of essential functions for the benefit of corporate profit-making.

Many working class households have no choice but to join physical queues. According to an Australian Council of Social Services advisory issued yesterday, “many people do not have a phone line or enough phone credit,” “about 2.6 million people do not use the internet” and “1.3 million households don’t even have access to the internet.”

This reflects the growing social divide between the wealthy elite and the rest of the population, including the most impoverished and vulnerable members of the working class.

As for the “supercharged welfare net” proclaimed by Morrison, the promised doubling of jobless and related benefits to a still poverty-line $1,100 a fortnight will not commence until late April.

The estimated 650,000 New Zealand citizens living in Australia, often settled in the country for many years, are not even entitled to any payments. Since 2001, they have been classified as “non-protected special category visa-holders.” Nearly 50,000 people have so far signed a petition calling for benefit eligibility.

They are among 2.4 million temporary visa holders in Australia, mostly workers, students and refugees, who cannot leave the country because of travel restrictions and who have none or very limited welfare entitlements.

Several further developments highlighted the governments’ cover-up of their lack of preparation for this predictable disaster.

The acute shortage of testing kits, which has led to tests being strictly restricted, was laid bare yesterday when a Melbourne-based company, MD Solutions, secured Therapeutic Goods Administration approval to import about 500,000 kits. But they will not arrive for at least a fortnight.

Health Minister Greg Hunt admitted in parliament yesterday that millions of face masks, which the Morrison government had promised on March 8, were diverted to another country. That is because of a global shortage and a scramble by other unprepared governments for supplies.

On March 8, Hunt had issued a media release claiming that obtaining the face masks showed that the Morrison government was “ahead of the curve,” adding: “Our approach puts the health and well-being of all Australians at the forefront of everything we are doing to deal with this evolving health crisis.”

Exactly the opposite is true. Everything the Liberal-National and Labor governments do is geared to the profit interests of the corporate giants. On top of allowing cruise ship companies to offload thousands of infected or potentially infected passengers, these governments are permitting airports to push planeloads of passengers arriving from overseas out into society without health checks.

An Australian correspondent who returned on the weekend reported: “At the airport, there were few precautions taken to prevent the spread of coronavirus: no small group checking for symptoms, no thermal scanning of passengers, no individual temperature checks and little questioning by Australian Border Force staff…

“Like hundreds of other passengers, we compulsorily exited through duty free. There were no restrictions on handling alcohol, perfume, chocolate bars, clothing or kids’ toys. The staff there were friendly and eager to make a sale.”

These revelations show the burning necessity to transform all these basic industries into publicly-owned and democratically-controlled organisations, in order to produce urgently required medical equipment and protect the lives of millions of people. That will happen only through the industrial and political mobilisation of the working class on the basis of a socialist program.

Risk of wider outbreak of COVID-19 remains high in South Korea

Ben McGrath

South Korea’s response to the global COVID-19 pandemic is being hailed as a success story when compared to the United States and Europe, which have both seen skyrocketing numbers of cases. As of Monday, there were 8,961 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in South Korea, with 64 new cases from the previous day. At least 111 people have passed away from the disease.

As the number of cases falls from a daily peak of 909 on February 29, health officials are turning their attention to preventing new outbreak centers. On Sunday, Seoul began testing travelers arriving from Europe and requiring all, even those who test negative, to quarantine themselves for 14 days. Forty-seven confirmed cases have come from travelers arriving from overseas.

Despite the seeming successes, the public health risk has not yet receded. Yun Tae-ho, a senior official in the Health Ministry, warned on Saturday against complacency. He said: “COVID-19 is spreading at an alarming rate around the world, and we are seeing sporadic mass infections. Considering COVID-19’s nature of high infection rate and fast spread, it is highly possible for the coronavirus epidemic to continue for a substantial period of time.”

A major reason for concern is that much of the government’s attention has been focused on Daegu and neighboring North Gyeongsang Province, the epicenter of the outbreak in the country. Last week, Dr. Kim U-ju, an expert on infectious disease at Korea University Guro Hospital, warned: “Serial group infections are occurring from confirmed patients linked to [a] call center in Guro. We’ve been looking into Shincheonji cases [in Daegu] only because the issue was so big. But I think other local communities are already having group infections, just as the call center showed.”

Kim was quoted on Monday, saying: “While it appears we have reached the boiling point, we must now be concerned about community transmission because we don’t know if there will be an explosive growth even from a small-scale group infection.”

The number of cases of COVID-19 initially remained low through mid-February, until a member of the Shincheonji cult in Daegu was confirmed to be infected. The secretive nature of the cult and its religious superstitions led to rapid community transmission. Widespread testing was then carried out, with 338,036 people receiving a test as of Monday.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Jeong Se-gyun announced that businesses in the entertainment industry, indoor gyms, and religious facilities should close for two weeks to stem the spread of COVID-19. The government also advised people not to go outdoors during this period unless it is an emergency. On Monday, Jeong announced the government would take legal action against the churches who continued to violate the quarantine measures the previous day.

The seriousness with which the government appears to be taking “social distancing” measures and their violations is at odds with the fact that workers are still being kept on the job, told only to stand two meters apart from other people, wear masks, and to head directly home after work. The inadequacy of these measures is already apparent from an outbreak of COVID-19 at a call center in Seoul’s Guro district.

After the first employee from the call center tested positive for the virus on March 8, there have been 152 cases linked to that workplace. With many workers using often packed public transportation, there is a risk that numerous people in Seoul could now be infected without their knowledge and spreading the disease. As of Sunday, the capital, nearby Incheon, and the surrounding Gyeonggi Province, with combined population of nearly 25 million people, have seen a combined 721 cases.

While public schools have been closed until April 5, many for-profit after-school academies, called hagwons, remain open, exposing students, teachers, and staff to greater risk. There are 86,435 hagwons in South Korea, providing tutoring services in math, English, and other subjects. The majority are operating, despite officials like Seoul Superintendent of Education Jo Hui-yeon saying, that closures were “not a choice but a must in order to protect public health.”

An investigation into the conditions in these schools has not even been conducted. Yonhap News Agency wrote Sunday: “The Education Ministry plans to conduct an investigation into the conditions surrounding hagwons attending by children and students while also looking into the activities of public facilities students often visit.”

Workers are being forced into dangerous situations amid fears of the pandemic’s impact on the economy. “We cannot rule out the possibility of negative growth (during the first quarter), given the impact of the virus on private spending, investment and exports,” said Finance Minister Hong Nam-gi on Friday. Last year, the economy grew at only 2 percent, the lowest in ten years. JPMorgan is now predicting annual growth of only 0.8 percent.

Last Thursday, Seoul and Washington agreed to a currency swap deal worth $US60 billion dollars after the country’s main stock index, the KOSPI, fell by 11 percent. It rebounded 7 percent following the deal. Seoul also announced a supplementary budget last week worth 11.7 trillion won ($US9.2 billion) and an addition 50 trillion ($US39.2 billion) that President Moon Jae-in claimed would support small businesses, though the money will be funneled into the pockets of banks and the wealthy.

Workers must also be warned that part of the reason for the seeming success of South Korea’s response to COVID-19 is due to police state measures in place, the framework of which was erected by the United States and Syngman Rhee following the division of the Korean Peninsula in 1945 and strengthened by thirty years of military dictatorship following Park Chung-hee’s coup in 1961. This scaffolding has never been torn down.

South Korea has relied on CCTV cameras, while tracking people’s bank cards and cell phones in order to determine who to test. In the hands of the capitalist state, this type of technology can and will be abused to muzzle social discontent, particularly as the economy declines. The deprivation of democratic rights makes it all the more clear that the tools used to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic and future crises must be in the hands of the working class.

US officials use economic fallout from pandemic to slash school funding

Phyllis Steele & Jerry White

At least 46 states and the District of Columbia in the United States have completely closed schools due to the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, affecting 54.5 million students. While the closures are necessary to slow the spread of the deadly disease, students are suffering from the loss of social interaction and access to counselors, nurses and a consistent food supply.

Some 22 million low-income students receive free or reduced cost breakfasts, lunches and in some cases dinners during the school year through a federal program run by the US Department of Agriculture. The school meals are the second largest federal anti-hunger program behind the government’s food stamp program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP.

A recent survey of directors of meal programs by the School Nutrition Association indicates that over 90 percent are concerned about students missing meals during the school closures. They are also concerned about the financial impact on their meal programs, which depend on cafeteria sales. Government reimbursements for the recorded number of students will be more difficult to collect during the closures.

Due to the school closures and lockdown orders, the country’s three largest districts in the US—New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago—along with urban and rural districts across the country have been forced to improvise using whatever resources are available to distribute meals as well as learning packets.

In New York City, with 1.1 million students, parents are being directed to 400 centers where they can pick up three meals from 7:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Roughly three-quarters of New York’s students qualify for free or reduced price school breakfasts and lunches.

A public school educator from the New York City borough of Queens told the World Socialist Web Site, “Some schools haven’t even been able to figure out how to contact a significant percentage of the kids, never mind support those who are in real need, with their parents quarantined and losing their jobs.

“They had their ‘training’ of teachers last week that provided just one more example of the unpreparedness and really the backward character of the educational system in terms of tech. They have been focusing so much on assessing teachers based on an unrealistic standard, downsizing in every area and forcing principals to rate low that they didn’t bother training people to bring them up to current levels of tech proficiency. Now they say they are going to distribute 300,000 laptops.

“Why wasn’t there funding for that before? They’ve left teachers, schools, kids and families in overcrowded, run-down buildings, cramming 34 kids in a room.”

Districts are implementing e-learning programs that are chaotic and unprepared. Students will struggle to receive the online instruction because of the impact of social inequality, including access to computers and an internet connection. Where there are restrictions against social gathering, students will not be able to go to libraries or fast food restaurants to access a Wi-Fi network. In addition, students with special needs will not be able to get instruction from trained special education teachers.

A teacher in Kingston, about 100 miles north of New York City, said there is a lack of ChromeBooks to continue coordinated educational programs, and younger students are not being prioritized. Her class is primarily immigrants, and she has been actively speaking with struggling parents, some of whom are not citizens and/or single, who have to continue working, making it very difficult to find childcare and prioritize their child’s education.

The Trump administration and the Democratic Party have been focused on propping up the stock market and giant corporations with trillions of dollars, leaving teachers, parents and children to scramble with scarce resources. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) abruptly cancelled an online briefing with school superintendents, leading the head of the School Superintendents Association to say superintendents are feeling “total confusion" over conflicting statements from the administration.

This is not simply a matter of confusion, however. Plans are already being made to exploit the crisis in order to implement even deeper cuts to public education, while diverting more public resources to for-profit charter schools, “public-private partnerships,” e-learning businesses and other privatization schemes.

The 2008-09 crisis led to a sharp reduction in federal and state funding and the loss of 351,000 jobs in education by mid-2012 while student attendance rose by 1,419,000. According to an analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, some of the jobs have been restored, but there is still a deficit of 135,000 school employees compared to 2008. The Obama administration used the financial crisis to goad cash-strapped school districts to lift the cap on charter schools and impose merit pay and punitive teacher accountability schemes, which punished teachers for educational problems caused by higher levels of poverty and decades of austerity.

Last week, Education Week published an article titled, “Districts Brace for Crash in State K-12 Revenue Due to Coronavirus,” which detailed plans being made to cut school district funding, particularly districts with low property values and tax revenues that are least able to afford it. “School districts should brace for a precipitous drop in state K-12 aid next year because of the coronavirus’s widespread impact on the economy—and they should start preparing now, funding experts warn,” the article states.

One school funding consultant told Education Week, “For districts, this is going to be a double whammy. There’s uncertainty on the revenue side as far as how much state aid districts are going to get … and, on the expense side, we’ve got to figure out how to respond to this new world. Districts need to begin planning for a new reality.”

State governments have already begun slash spending and reneging on pay raises promised to teachers after the wave of strikes over the last two years by more than 700,000 educators demanding wage increases and the restoration of state school spending to pre-2008 levels.

Last week, the Kentucky state Senate passed a budget bill that will withhold $1.3 billion from teacher pension funding unless the unions agree to cut retirement benefits for newly hired teachers. Protesting teachers were not allowed in the capitol because of coronavirus restrictions on large gatherings.

In Tennessee last week, Republican Governor Bill Lee cut in half the amount of money he wants to set aside for teacher pay raises and then got rid of a $250 million proposal to provide mental health services in schools. He instead set aside that money in the state’s “emergency fund,” Education Week reported.

“Maryland’s legislature, which raced to approve legislation this week before adjourning its session early, added a clause to an ambitious school funding overhaul that would pull all new funding in the case of a recession.” In Wisconsin a plan to spend more on special education was shelved.

Districts are also incurring large unexpected costs by delivering meals to students, setting up makeshift child-care centers, and purchasing distance learning materials for students, the article notes. In addition, costs are expected to rise next year when students, many emotionally traumatized and behind academically, return to school.

“Any substitute teacher or transportation savings districts might gain by shaving off weeks or months off the school year will be outstripped by new intervention and counseling costs, experts warn,” the article notes. “States are going to take a massive hit,” predicted Marguerite Roza, a Georgetown University school finance expert. “School districts will be fine through the end of the school year. But next year is going to be a come-to-Jesus moment.”

Like they did after the global financial crash in 2008, the teacher unions will collaborate in the new and far deeper attacks on teachers and public education that are coming. That is why educators and all sections of workers have to take up a struggle against the plans of the corporate and financial elite to exploit the crisis to funnel even more money into their bank accounts and instead take up the fight for a program that defends the interests of the working class.

In its statement “How to Fight the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Program for the Working Class,” the Socialist Equality Party calls for free and universal testing, immediate and cost-free treatment for all those infected, an emergency program to expand the healthcare infrastructure, the immediate closure of all schools, nonessential plants and workplaces, with full income for workers affected. We urge all educators who agree with this program to join the Socialist Equality Party and take up the fight for socialism.

Palestinians face humanitarian catastrophe from coronavirus

Jean Shaoul

Health authorities confirmed the first two cases of the coronavirus in Gaza this weekend—citizens who had returned from Pakistan and entered Gaza via Egypt.

The arrival of the coronavirus in one of the most densely populated places on earth heralds a humanitarian catastrophe not just for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, but people all over the world who face similar atrocious living conditions and a lack of healthcare.

While hundreds of Gazans have returned home in the past two weeks, just 92 people have been tested, due to lack of test kits, suggesting that the number of cases is far higher. More than 1,270 people are in quarantine in hospitals, hotels and schools after crossing into Gaza from Israel and Egypt.

Two weeks ago, Hamas, the bourgeois clerical group that controls Gaza, closed schools and sent in sanitation crews to patrol the streets and public buildings and spray disinfectant. On Friday, it ordered the shuttering of weekly street markets and wedding halls and closed its borders, saying only patients requiring urgent medical treatment outside Gaza would be allowed to cross into Egypt or Israel.

View of Gaza (Photo: wikipedia.org)

Israel said it was its closing borders with Gaza and the occupied West Bank to commercial traffic, though some patients and humanitarian staff would be allowed to cross. It has sent a derisory 200 coronavirus testing kits to Gaza. Cogat, the Israeli military body that coordinates with the Palestinian Authority, said in a breathtakingly cynical statement, “Viruses and diseases have no borders, and so prevention of an outbreak of the coronavirus in Gaza [and the West Bank] are a prime Israeli interest.”

This foreseeable and foreseen disaster comes after Israel’s 13-year-long siege that has rendered Gaza almost uninhabitable, due extreme overcrowding, collapsed infrastructure, lack of electricity and water, poor sanitary conditions and the gutting of an already limited healthcare system. There is a chronic shortage of drugs, and Gaza’s barely functioning hospitals have struggled to cope with the thousands of horrendous injuries and amputations inflicted on Palestinians by Israel’s armed forces during the weekly “Great March of Return” that started two years ago.

Palestinians in Gaza, living in squalid makeshift camps and slums, have no possibility of either controlling the spread of the virus or accessing medical treatment and supplies. According to Abdelnasser Soboh, director of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Gaza office, Gaza has only 62 ventilators, with all but 15 already in use, and needs at least another 100. He believes that Gaza’s hospitals can only handle the first 100 cases, if they come in gradually.

It is a death sentence for thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of Gaza’s nearly two million inhabitants. Israel is, as the occupier of Gaza and the West Bank, under the Hague Convention (1907) and the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) legally responsible for the safety and welfare of civilian residents, a responsibility Israel denies.

The Palestinian Authority (PA), which governs parts of the West Bank, has reported 59 cases, mostly in Bethlehem, including 17 who recovered. It announced a 14-day curfew, ordering everyone except the security forces, medical staff and food sellers to stay at home and closing roads between cities, towns and villages. Bethlehem has already been under lockdown for weeks. Prisoners who had served half of their sentence for criminal offences were given a pardon and released to reduce the numbers in Palestinian jails.

Despite the severity of the situation, Israel sent just 100 testing kits for the coronavirus to Ramallah.

The situation is no less dire for Palestinians throughout the region. In Israel, where 20 percent of the population are Palestinian, health authorities have confirmed that 1,071 people have tested positive for the coronavirus, one patient has died and 18 are in serious condition.

With healthcare facilities decimated by decades of cuts and unable to cope, the caretaker government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered people not to leave their homes other than to go to work, shop for groceries or seek medical care and closed schools, universities and cultural and leisure facilities. It has banned gatherings of more than 10 people and entry to foreigners unless can prove they are able to self-quarantine for 14 days upon their arrival.

In neighbouring Jordan, which hosts one of the largest refugee populations—from Palestine, Iraq and Syria—per capita in the world, some 70 percent of the 9.7 million population is of Palestinian origin, with 3.2 million Palestinians registered as refugees. There are also at least 650,000 registered Syrian refugees, more than half of whom live in the squalid camps in Za'atari, Marjeeb al-Fahood, Cyber City and Al-Azraq, with at least another one million unregistered Syrians living in the country.

Amman has confirmed that 69 people have tested positive for the virus. On Tuesday, with Jordan’s already feeble economy in free-fall and healthcare facilities incapable of dealing with the virus, there was rioting at a prison in Irbid where two people were killed after visits were banned, King Abdullah signed an emergency law giving the government sweeping powers.

The government announced a nationwide, round-the-clock curfew, in from Saturday, closing schools, universities, leisure centres and workplaces, except for essential services, sealing the country’s borders and banning movement except for emergencies, saying, “The government will announce on Tuesday 24 March certain times when citizens will be allowed to run errands.” Those requiring urgent medical treatment would have to notify security authorities. Some 400 people have already been arrested for ignoring the curfew and face up to a year in jail.

In Lebanon, 10 percent of its 6.8 million population are of Palestinian origin, with most registered as refugees. They have long been denied basic rights—not allowed to attend public schools, work in a number of professions such as doctors and lawyers, own property or pass on inheritances.

The health authorities have reported 230 cases and four deaths in a country whose healthcare system lacks the most basic facilities. Only one hospital in the country is equipped with specialised isolation rooms compliant with international standards.

The pandemic comes amid Lebanon’s default on its $30 billion Eurobond and declaration that it needs its foreign currency reserves for key imports. Last week, the shaky new government of Hassan Diab, formed after protests brought down the government of Saad Hariri, announced a “state of medical emergency,” closing all public and private institutions except hospitals, pharmacies and bakeries, with supermarkets only open at specific times, in an effort to contain the coronavirus outbreak. The banks are closed until March 29.

On Saturday, after the government called in the army to enforce the stay at home orders, patrols drove through the streets of Beirut ordering groups of people to disperse, while army helicopters flew over other parts of the country calling out on loud speakers for those out on the streets to return home.

On Sunday, Syria, where there were 650,000 Palestinians before the nine-year proxy war to topple President Bashar al-Assad, confirmed its first case of the coronavirus. Damascus announced a ban on public transport and stepped up the lockdown introduced a few days ago that included the closure of schools, parks, restaurants and many public institutions. It has called off army conscription, issued a prisoner amnesty and ordered bakeries to close their stalls and deliver to customers at home.

A few weeks ago, a WHO spokesperson warned that Syria’s “fragile health systems may not have the capacity to detect and respond” to the pandemic. This is particularly the case in the crowded camps for tens of thousands of displaced Syrians.

The situation is no better in the rest of the Middle East and North Africa, where in country after country—Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Sudan, Syria and Iran—healthcare systems have been ravaged by years of wars and/or sanctions, orchestrated by US imperialism. Their plight foreshadows what is to come in the poorest countries of the world, where as many as one billion people, one seventh of the world’s population, live in squalid, makeshift shacks, without proper sanitation or access to clean water, basic services and healthcare.

Germany: Appalling lack of protective equipment in COVID-19 outbreak

Markus Salzmann

The German government and the European Central Bank are pumping hundreds of billions of euros into the accounts of corporations and banks to protect them from the economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. But when it comes to protecting the health of the population, government action is marked by criminal irresponsibility.

In Germany, for example, it is still virtually impossible to be tested for the life-threatening virus unless you can prove that you have been in a crisis area or have had contact with someone who is already infected. Even people with symptoms of the disease are refused tests.

The irresponsibility of the government is also shown by the lack of enough protective masks and other urgently needed equipment. Although doctors’ representatives and suppliers of protective clothing had warned of this weeks ago, the federal government reacted with ignorance and inaction. Now, the masks are becoming scarce in clinics, doctors’ offices and medical services—with fatal consequences for the fight against COVID-19.

As Walter Plassmann, head of the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians, explained last Tuesday, the federal government had promised to help with the procurement of protective equipment. In fact, nothing had happened. “We did not get a single mask,” news magazine Der Spiegel quotes Plassmann, who warned, “If we run out of protective equipment, we are finished.”

Achim Theiler, the managing director of a company that produces and sells hygienic clothing, mouthguards and respirators for hospitals and doctors, told Der Spiegel that the federal Ministry of Health had been ignoring the warnings of manufacturers and suppliers for weeks.

“We have issued warnings, and nobody has heard us,” said Theiler. “This is gross negligence and unnecessarily aggravates the crisis.” On February 5, he had contacted federal Health Minister Jens Spahn (Christian Democratic Union, CDU) by email and vigorously urged him to reserve the corresponding quantities, as Germany was threatened with a dramatic shortage. “I appeal to you not to underestimate the problem of this virus,” Theiler wrote.

On February 10, Theiler contacted the health ministry again and referred to an official announcement by the World Health Organisation (WHO) that there was a threat of a shortage of protective equipment worldwide, especially respiratory masks. At the time, Der Spiegel had also reported on supply problems in Germany. Theiler requested that this information be passed on immediately to the appropriate authorities. “Nobody reacted,” he was forced to conclude.

Several doctors, such as the head of a Munich clinic, Axel Fischer, also complained that the federal and state governments had not acted despite the anticipated problems. It is known that around 97 percent of the world market production of face masks is located in China, whose government imposed an export ban on products of this type in January.

Although the number of infected and sick people is still rising rapidly, supply bottlenecks are already occurring, as clinics in particular generally hold only a small number of stocks for cost reasons.

Without adequate protective equipment, doctors and nursing staff are exposed to a high risk of infection. In the event of an infection, the doctor or employee in question is then absent, which further exacerbates an already strained situation. Moreover, there is a risk of the virus being transmitted to patients, i.e., sick and vulnerable people. This means that patient care is not possible without protective clothing. “Then we will have to close the hospital,” Elmar Wagenbach, head of Eschweiler hospital, told Der Spiegel.

The limited supplies are already largely used up. Should requested deliveries not arrive, they would run out in Hamburg at the weekend, KV boss Plassmann explained.

The hospital association in North Rhine-Westphalia sounded the alarm that in the state with the most COVID-19 cases, most hospitals only had protective material for about 14 days. In clinics, staff are often instructed to use only one mask per day, or the mask—which is designed as a disposable product—is used several times.

The situation in doctors’ surgeries is similarly dramatic. Here, too, there is an acute shortage. Even weeks ago, masks, protective clothing and disinfectants were no longer available. In some cases, family doctors bought breathing masks from the DIY store at their own expense, which are normally used by painters. According to a survey by the doctors’ news service, more than 80 percent of doctors in private practice are already complaining about a lack of protective equipment and are considering closing their practice.

If material can be ordered and delivered, then it is only at horrendous prices. While face masks normally cost between 50 and 80 cents per piece, up to 20 euros are now being charged. After large quantities of disinfectants and protective material have been stolen from clinics for fear of the virus, they now have to be kept under lock and key or guarded by security personnel.

The lack of urgently needed material is not limited to face masks and disinfectants. There are also increasing shortages of respirators, oxygen and medication.

Important drugs needed for intensive care are also becoming scarce and their price is rising. The anaesthetic propofol is no longer available in sufficient quantities and the price per ampoule has increased twenty-fold in the last few days. The WHO warned over a week ago of a shortage of medical equipment to combat the coronavirus pandemic.

The statement by Health Minister Spahn that Germany is well prepared for an outbreak of COVID-19 turns out to be a brazen lie. Serious deficiencies are already evident in every area of the health system. COVID-19 tests, which in any case are not being carried out nationwide, cannot be carried out systematically due to the strain on doctors and health authorities. In the last 20 years, about one third of physician posts in the public health authorities have been cut, while pay is significantly lower than can be earned in a private clinic.

The staffing situation in German clinics and nursing homes was already catastrophic before the outbreak of the pandemic; 17,000 vacancies currently exist in nursing care. Poor pay and even worse working conditions are the main reasons for this. In addition, there has been a massive reduction in hospital beds in recent years. If the situation in Germany follows that in Italy, there would be nowhere near enough intensive care beds in the country.

This catastrophic position makes clear where privatisation, profit gouging, austerity measures and a market-focused orientation have led in the health care system. In order to combat the pandemic, substantial funds must be made available immediately to provide the material and staffing required in all clinics and medical facilities. The profit orientation in the health care system must be ended immediately and be replaced by a planned orientation toward the needs of society.

US Congress moves toward massive bailout of big business

Patrick Martin

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell closed out the Senate session Monday night without bringing his proposed $2 trillion bonanza for corporate America to a vote. There is, however, little doubt that the legislation will be passed by the Republican-controlled Senate and the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives within a day or two.

The highly publicized wrangling between Democrats and Republicans over the exact terms of the absurdly named CARES Act (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act) is only political theater, engaged in by both parties in order to disguise the highway robbery being carried out by corporate America, using the coronavirus crisis as a pretext.

This massive boondoggle has nothing to do with helping people endangered either medically or financially by the epidemic and the economic dislocation it has caused. The financial aristocracy has seized on the public health crisis as an opportunity to raid the federal treasury, plundering the American people and grabbing whatever it can.

Following the motto of Democrat Rahm Emanuel—“Never let a good crisis go to waste”—both parties are using the COVID-19 epidemic as a chance to obtain favors for their corporate masters beyond their wildest dreams and far beyond anything they carried out in the 2008-2009 bailout of Wall Street and the auto industry.

As it stands now, the bill drafted by the Republican leadership and endorsed by Trump—he urged Monday that it be passed exactly as presented by McConnell—would provide more than $1.8 trillion in financial aid and other appropriations, the bulk of it directed to the big corporations and the wealthy.

The provisions include:

* $500 billion for large corporations

* $350 billion for “small business”

* $300 billion in direct payments to households

* $250 billion for state unemployment benefit funds

* $136 billion in additional funds for federal agencies, including the military and the Department of Homeland Security

* $106 billion in payments to hospitals, the Veterans Administration and other public health agencies.

The biggest single slice, $500 billion in loans and loan guarantees for big corporations, has been widely termed a “slush fund” under the control of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. While the money is earmarked to some extent—$50 billion to passenger airlines, $8 billion to cargo airlines, and $17 billion to firms supplying the Pentagon or intelligence agencies with critical equipment and capabilities—the bulk of is to be distributed by the Treasury as Mnuchin decides.

Companies receiving aid are required to maintain the same employment levels as prevailed on March 13, 2020, but only “to the extent practicable,” a loophole that renders the requirement completely meaningless.

Other rules prohibit companies that receive federal bailouts from engaging in stock buybacks, bonuses and other measures to enrich their executives, but Mnuchin has the authority to waive all such requirements at his discretion. In addition, the identity of the companies receiving the cash is to be concealed, so that there will be no oversight except by the Trump administration.

There is no restriction, even of a formal character, on the gargantuan salaries of the CEOs and other top executives of major companies like Boeing. The former and current top officials of Boeing should be criminally prosecuted for such crimes as manufacturing what they knew to be the defective 737 Max jet, two of which crashed on takeoff, killing a total of 356 people. Instead, they are being rewarded by having their eight-figure incomes underwritten by the taxpayers.

When the Obama administration bailed out the auto industry in 2009, by contrast, the Democrats and Republicans demanded steep cuts in the wages and benefits of autoworkers, including a 50 percent cut in the starting pay for new hires. No such demands were made then of the auto executives, and there will be no cuts for the corporate CEOs this time around either.

As for the $350 billion for “small businesses,” the description of what constitutes such an entity—effectively any company with fewer than 500 employees—is so elastic that most hedge funds will be queuing up to shove their snouts in that particular trough. The Trump Organization, the president’s personal holding company, has about 500 direct employees, as do several of its subsidiaries. Asked whether his own company would benefit from the massive bailout bill, Trump would reply only, “We’ll have to see.”

There is no question that the lion’s share of the “small business” funding will be gobbled up by those able to hire the necessary lobbyists and lawyers, not by family-owned restaurants, dry cleaners or gas stations. These funds are particularly enticing because even the loan portion of the program can be “forgiven” at the discretion of the Treasury.

The main issues in dispute between the Democrats and Republicans are how much of the bill should be devoted to window dressing as opposed to the central purpose of the bill, aiding the corporations and the wealthy, which both parties enthusiastically support.

The Democrats advocate a bit more camouflage, in the form of funds for state and local governments and hospitals and direct payments to workers. The wrangling in the Senate has allowed even hardened right-wingers like Joe Manchin of West Virginia to posture as advocates of working people.

Among the provisions in the Senate bill that have drawn little attention is the exclusion from the $1,200 per adult cash payment of anyone who did not file an income tax return for 2018 or 2019. This includes millions of Americans, most of them poor, who relied entirely on nontaxable Social Security or retirement income, or who had no taxable income at all and were dependent on various forms of federal and state aid.

Another provision would bar any funds going to “nonprofits receiving Medicaid expenditures,” language that would exclude Planned Parenthood, a frequent target of attack by anti-abortion zealots among the Christian fundamentalists who exercise vast influence in the Republican Party. It could also exclude payments to agencies providing disability assistance, nursing home care and other social services.

In the maneuvers around the passage of the corporate bailout, Majority Leader McConnell telegraphed the real purpose of the bill by attempting to schedule a vote for 9:45 a.m. on Monday morning. He calculated that this would create the maximum pressure for passage, since the New York Stock Exchange opens trading at 9:30 a.m. and an immediate plunge would trigger a 15-minute “circuit breaker” halting trading.

This maneuver failed only because Democratic Minority Leader Charles Schumer delayed the vote until noon, but the message was clear: Wall Street wants this bill, and its ultimate passage is accordingly assured. (Schumer has received more campaign cash from New York financial interests than any other senator).

The backroom negotiations between McConnell, Schumer, Mnuchin, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy continue under conditions of an all-out mobilization of corporate lobbyists across Washington, whose dimensions were summed up by the New York Times in the headline, “Coronavirus Stimulus Package Spurs a Lobbying Gold Rush.”

“The prospect of a bailout of a scale without precedent has set off a rush to the fiscal trough, with businesses enduring undeniable dislocation jostling with more opportunistic interests to ensure they get a share,” the Times wrote. Among the many claimants were the sportswear company Adidas, “seeking support for a long-sought provision allowing people to use pretax money to pay for gym memberships and fitness equipment,” and drone manufacturers, claiming that they can “deliver medical supplies or food without risking human contact that could spread the virus.”

Military, Trump administration ready plans for domestic crackdown as virus spreads across US

Eric London

According to a Politico report published Saturday, the Trump administration, through Attorney General William Barr, is urging Congress to pass legislation that would allow for the suspension of due process during the coronavirus crisis.

President Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr, Monday, March 23, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

The administration proposal calls for the suspension of habeas corpus, the centuries-old democratic principle protecting the right of a person under arrest to require the government prove the legality of the arrest in a hearing before a judge.

Justice Department documents call for giving the attorney general the power to override constitutional protections in federal court proceedings “wherever the district court is fully or partially closed by virtue of any national disaster, civil disobedience, or other emergency situation.” This would apply to “any statutes or rules of procedure otherwise affecting pre-arrest, post-arrest, pre-trial, trial, and post-trial procedures in criminal and juvenile proceedings and all civil process and proceedings.”

The proposal underscores the criminality of the ruling class’s response to the dangerous spread of the virus.

On the one hand, the Trump administration has responded to the devastating impact of the crisis with a policy of malign neglect, ignoring warnings, refusing to provide adequate testing and failing to produce and distribute masks and other medical equipment needed to save millions of lives. Even after having declared a “national emergency,” the ruling class has made very little money available for disease prevention and mitigation and to protect the working class from the economic fallout of mass sickness and unemployment.

On the other hand, the ruling class has made trillions available to the banks and corporations and lowered interest rates to near-zero to prop up the stock market. Now, as the administration confronts growing anger over its response and a wave of walkouts by workers in key industries, it is preparing to defend the wealth of the rich through dictatorial forms of rule.

Politico cited civil rights lawyer Norman L. Reimer, who said that pursuant to the Justice Department proposal, “you could be arrested and never brought before a judge until they decide that the emergency or the civil disobedience is over.” He continued, “I find it absolutely terrifying … That is something that should not happen in a democracy.”

The Politico report claims the Justice Department’s requests “are unlikely to make it through a Democratic led-House.” This is cold comfort, however, considering that the Democratic Party is currently advancing similar anti-democratic measures, such as the EARN IT Act, a bipartisan bill that would abolish end-to-end encryption. The Democrats are, moreover, the most vocal in attacking free speech and calling for internet censorship.

The Justice Department’s request for extraordinary executive powers comes as two Newsweek reports by William Arkin detail how the US military is preparing to potentially take control of the day-to-day governing of the country and to deploy troops on US soil.

The first Newsweek report, published March 18, notes that “Above-Top Secret contingency plans already exist for what the military is supposed to do if all the Constitutional successors are incapacitated” by the virus, that is, if Trump and all those in the presidential line of succession become ill or are quarantined. “Standby orders were issued more than three weeks ago to ready these plans, not just to protect Washington but also to prepare for the possibility of some form of martial law,” the report continues.

It adds: “According to new documents and military experts, the various plans—codenamed Octagon, Freejack and Zodiac—are underground laws to ensure government continuity. They are so secret that under these extraordinary plans, ‘devolution’ could circumvent the normal Constitutional provisions for government succession, and military commanders could be placed in control around America.”

Newsweek also reports that should the military step in to subvert the Constitution, the commander of the US Northern Command (NORTHCOM), General Terrence O’Shaughnessy, “would in theory be in charge if Washington were eviscerated” by the virus.

The second Newsweek report, published March 20, states that the US military “is preparing forces to assume a larger role in the coronavirus response, including the controversial mission of quelling ‘civil disturbances.’”

The plans center on federalizing the state national guards, effectively nullifying the principle of posse comitatus, which bars the military from conducting domestic law enforcement operations.

Newsweek cites “a senior military planner working on coronavirus but not authorized to speak on sensitive planning matters,” who “says that deployment of federal troops in support roles is being prepared,” including to conduct traffic stops, home searches and seizures and arrests.

The report continues: “Once military forces are dispersed off bases in America, the senior planner says, they will have to contend with ‘force protection’ and will be thrust into difficult general law enforcement roles, particularly as shelter-in-place and other quarantine situations escalate.”

As necessary as quarantines and other protective measures are from a public health standpoint, the focus of the military’s response is to prepare to suppress democratic rights and put down social opposition.

Newsweek references an internal military plan for “Civil Disturbance Operations” called CONPLAN 3502. The plan relates to domestic military deployments in response to “riots, acts of violence, insurrections, unlawful obstructions or assemblages, group acts of violence, and disorders prejudicial to public law and order,” according to a military study, which cites as historical precedent the use of the military to crush strikes and labor protests.

According to a 2006 Homeland Security Department document not cited in the Newsweek report, titled “National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza,” the government has made specific preparations for the possibility of protests during a pandemic.

“Due to stresses placed upon the health care system and other critical functions, civil disturbances and breakdowns in public order may occur,” the Bush-era document reads. The pandemic security document also references CONPLAN 3502 and states: “Tasks performed by military forces may include joint patrolling with law enforcement officers; securing key buildings, memorials, intersections and bridges; and acting as a quick reaction force.”

On February 1, Defense Secretary Mark Esper signed a secret set of Warning Orders (WARNORD) putting NORTHCOM and units deployed to the eastern seaboard on alert that they should “prepare to deploy,” including to the “National Capital Region.”

Newsweek reports that “now, planners are looking at a military response to urban violence as people seek protection and fight over food and, according to one senior officer, in the contingency of the complete evacuation of Washington.”

The Trump administration has invoked the Stafford Act and the Defense Production Act, but has thus far refused to exercise those provisions by which the government can force corporations to mass produce equipment needed to address the crisis.

In a New York Times op-ed yesterday, Massachusetts physician Daniel M. Horn wrote that “without swift action, parts of the United States will run out of ventilators in the coming weeks,” as COVID-19 cases skyrocket. Horn warned that “there appears to be no firm plan other than re-purposing ventilators from surgery centers.” He added, “How can we build a nimble logistics operation that can rapidly deploy those machines the moment that a shortage appears imminent? The truth is: We have no idea.”

Instead of addressing the urgent need for mass production of medical equipment and protective gear for health care workers, the ruling class has responded to the crisis by pouring money into the stock markets and preparing to suppress social opposition. This is the response of a capitalist social order that poses a great risk to the fate of tens of millions of people.