Trump’s incompetence leaves people in disbelief: Guardian

US President Donald Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has been sharply condemned by US experts as severely inadequate, is ruining America’s reputation as a competent country, according to British media.

Trump’s incompetence and dishonesty in managing the COVID-19 pandemic have left foreign observers as well as Americans in disbelief and may permanently tarnish the US standing around the world, The Guardian newspaper reported on Sunday.

“Erratic behavior, tolerated in the past, is now seen as downright dangerous. It’s long been plain, at least to many in Europe, that Trump could not be trusted. Now he is seen as a threat. It is not just about failed leadership. It’s about openly hostile, reckless actions,” the newspaper said.

International action has also been hampered at the UN Security Council by US objections over terminology. Trump has ignored impassioned calls to create a coronavirus global taskforce or coalition.

The new coronavirus, which causes a respiratory disease known as COVID-19, is believed to have emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan late last year.

Last month, the Group of Seven (G7) countries failed to agree on a joint statement on tackling the COVID-19 pandemic because US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insisted on calling it the “Wuhan virus”.

“The Trump administration’s self-centered, haphazard, and tone-deaf response [to COVID-19] will end up costing Americans trillions of dollars and thousands of otherwise preventable deaths,” wrote Stephen Walt, a professor of international relations at Harvard University.

“But that’s not the only damage the United States will suffer. Far from ‘making America great again’, this epic policy failure will further tarnish [its] reputation as a country that knows how to do things effectively,” he said.

This adverse shift could be permanent, Walt warned.

The United States, with the world’s third-largest population, has recorded more fatalities and infections from the coronavirus than any other country, leaving over 22,000 dead and over 555,000 infected as of Monday, according to a Reuters tally.

About 2,000 deaths were reported for each of the last four days in a row. Experts say official statistics have understated the actual number of people who have succumbed to the respiratory disease, having excluded coronavirus-related deaths at home.