The U.S. Response to COVID-19

March 16, 2020

With cases of COVID-19 (coronavirus) now confirmed across the United States, how prepared is the country to robustly respond? What steps can be taken to contain the epidemic in the weeks ahead?

In this Call with the Experts podcast, RAND researchers discuss the U.S. COVID-19 response from a variety of perspectives including pandemic preparedness, emergency response capacity and delivery, and economic impacts. They also discuss innovative ways communities, schools, hospitals, and health care systems might be able to respond, as well as some of the risks posed by the outbreak that are now coming into focus:

• Jennifer Bouey, the Tang Chair in China Policy Studies at RAND, is an epidemiologist whose research focuses on global health strategies and the social determinants of health.
• Laura J. Faherty is a senior physician policy researcher and an assistant professor of pediatrics at the Boston University School of Medicine.
• Courtney Gidengil is a senior physician policy researcher who is board-certified in both general pediatrics and pediatric infectious diseases.
• Jennifer Kavanagh is a senior political scientist, the Joel and Joanne Mogy Truth Decay Fellow, and the leader of RAND's Countering Truth Decay initiative.

Jeffrey Hiday from the RAND Office of Media Relations moderates.