“The President’s Disdain for Science,”

In early January 2018, Bill Clinton’s science adviser, Neal F. Lane, and I published a New York Times opinion column titled, “The President’s Disdain for Science,” which began, “Since World War II, no American president has shown greater disdain for science—or more lack of awareness of its likely costs.” That statement has proved prophetic. But when we wrote that piece, we had little idea of the horrendous human consequences of Trump’s disdain: the thousands of American lives lost and millions of livelihoods shattered.

Now the number of confirmed coronavirus cases exceeds seven million, well over two percent of the US population, and millions more have likely been infected. US deaths have passed 205,000, and total federal outlays—not including state and local costs—exceed $3 trillion, with over 14 million people out of work.

The grotesque inadequacies of the Trump administration’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic have been well and widely documented in this and other publications. Curiously, however, the deadly results of that chaotic, unscientific and constantly shifting response have drawn much less attention. There seems to be a widespread aversion to estimating how many Americans have died unnecessarily because President Trump refused to deal quickly and scientifically with the pandemic.

Such a calculation is not particularly difficult to make. An examination of relevant national statistics shows that the Trump pandemic response has led to the unnecessary deaths of more than 100,000 Americans.