https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/george-bush-2005-wait-pandemic-late-prepare/story?id=69979013
George W. Bush in 2005: 'If we wait for a pandemic to appear, it will be too late to prepare'
A book about the 1918 flu pandemic spurred the government to action.
By
Matthew Mosk
April 5, 2020, 3:08 AM
8 min read
George W. Bush was on vacation at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, when he began flipping through an advance reading copy of a new book about the 1918 flu pandemic. He couldn't put it down.
When he returned to Washington, he called his top homeland security adviser into the Oval Office and gave her the galley of historian John M. Barry's "The Great Influenza," which told the chilling tale of the mysterious plague that "would kill more people than the outbreak of any other disease in human history."
"You've got to read this," Fran Townsend remembers the president telling her. "He said, 'Look, this happens every 100 years. We need a national strategy.'" (continued in link)
George W. Bush in 2005: 'If we wait for a pandemic to appear, it will be too late to prepare'
A book about the 1918 flu pandemic spurred the government to action.
By
Matthew Mosk
April 5, 2020, 3:08 AM
8 min read
George W. Bush was on vacation at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, when he began flipping through an advance reading copy of a new book about the 1918 flu pandemic. He couldn't put it down.
When he returned to Washington, he called his top homeland security adviser into the Oval Office and gave her the galley of historian John M. Barry's "The Great Influenza," which told the chilling tale of the mysterious plague that "would kill more people than the outbreak of any other disease in human history."
"You've got to read this," Fran Townsend remembers the president telling her. "He said, 'Look, this happens every 100 years. We need a national strategy.'" (continued in link)
