A European Travel Ban to the U.S. Came At Least 5 Weeks Too Late: Here’s a Timeline of the Fallout
Skift Take
If airlines and travelers are counting on airport screenings and quarantines to be a effective counter-measures in the absence of a coronavirus vaccine, the CDC said these tactics will "have less impact" when transmissions are widespread. Everything depends on effective vaccines.
President Trump didn't impose bans on European travelers, including those from coronavirus-ravaged Italy, until mid-March. That, along with events such as Mardi Gras, and returning cruisers from nine Nile River cruises in February and early March, contributed to the rapid spread of Covid-19 in the United States.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention didn't specify that it was White House malfeasance that quickened the spread of coronavirus spread in the United States, but it's clear from a timeline and charts that Skift culled from the federal agency's May 1 report where a portion of the responsibility lies. [See the report embedded below.]
Commenting on the CDC report, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said Sunday that while much of the coronavirus focus months ago was on travelers from China, where the infections began, travelers from Europe, including Italy, were walking freely through New York area airports unscreened.
Contrary to President Trump characterizing
