President Donald Trump is exploring ways to reopen the US economy in the next two weeks from the lockdowns imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, White House Economic Adviser Larry Kudlow said in an interview on Tuesday
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 24th March, 2020) President Donald Trump is exploring ways to reopen the US economy in the next two weeks from the lockdowns imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, White House Economic Adviser Larry Kudlow said in an interview on Tuesday.
"I think the president would like to do something in the next couple of weeks," Kudlow told FOX News. "That doesn't mean we're going to walk away from the mitigating advice that we've received from our health specialist and so forth. It just means we're going to take a slightly different look at this."
Trump told a news conference on Monday that he was thinking of allowing businesses to reopen and workers to return to their jobs in some of the "safe" areas of the country.
On Tuesday, Trump in a tweet said while they will continue practicing social distancing and seniors will be watched over, "people want to return to work." Trump also warned that the "cure" cannot be worse than the problem and urged Congress to act.
Numerous health experts interviewed on news networks have disagreed with the president that the administration should relax on the shutdowns, with the United States reporting some 2,000 new cases of the Covid-19 a day. As of Tuesday noon in Washington, the number of US infections from the novel strain of the coronavirus reached nearly 44,000, while the death toll stood at almost 550.
"It's going to be a question of balance and trade-offs," Kudlow said on the Fox interview.� "I don't want to get specific on details because it (hasn't) been mapped out. But there's no question. We have to think seriously, I would say after the 15-day period is over, which I guess that's the end of this week or the weekend, we will take another look at the possibility of targeting areas that you know are safe enough."
Kudlow added that "a lot of people in business and finance", particularly "small business people", have called the administration to ask if there was a possibility to "liberalize" some of the shutdowns in the economy.
"Look, a bad economy if it continues and continues to decline is unhealthy by itself," he said. "So that's an important point."
Kudlow reiterated that any reopening of the economy will be done with the assent and assistance of health specialists. "There's no question about that. There's no war going on. It's just a matter of where it's possible to open places that are not hot zones."
Kudlow's remarks came as US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin backed the Homeland Security Department on Tuesday in categorizing the financial services sector and its workers as essential and critical in the nation's response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Mnuchin described financial services sector workers as those needed to process and maintain systems for processing financial transactions and services, such as payment, clearing and settlement services, wholesale funding, insurance services and capital markets activities.
Essential financial services workers provide consumer access to banking and lending services, including automated teller machines and the movement of Currency through armored cash carriers,Mnuchin said, adding they also supported financial operations, data and security operations centers.
