AGENCIES / WHITE HOUSE /WASHINGTON
U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday declared a national emergency, invoking the Stafford Act to allow more federal aid to stream to states and cities to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
“We will overcome the threat of the virus,” the president said Friday afternoon at a nationally-televised news conference from the White House Rose Garden.
Trump, who has declared five previous national emergencies, had come under increasing pressure, especially from opposition Democrats, in recent days to take such action as governors and mayors across the United States declared states of emergency, ordering the cancellation of public gatherings and closure of schools.
The action by the president will free up tens of billions of dollars in funding in the Disaster Relief Fund. It allows a state to request the federal government pay for 75 percent of costs for such expenses as emergency workers, medical supplies and tests and vaccinations to respond to the virus, which some epidemiologists warn could soon overwhelm the country’s health care system.
“States are to set up emergency operation centers immediately, and all hospitals are to activate their emergency operation plans,” said Trump.
Cases of the coronavirus have now been reported in 47 of the 50 U.S. states.
Only about one percent of the 136,000 cases of the COVID-19 disease are in the United States, but public health officials are bracing for a much larger number of patients. Some officials say the number may actually be much larger because of limited testing conducted, so far, for the coronavirus infection.