11 March—A scourge, from the Latin “excoriare,” (“to strip off hide,” as in excoriate), through the French “escorgier,” is a whip or lash. Its figurative meaning has been extended to be a cause of usually widespread calamity and is commonly applied to disease and war, which obviously destroy many lives and create havoc and calamity in general.

It was five years ago today that the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic—after more than 118,000 cases and 4,300 deaths in 114 countries. Thus COVID-19 was—and may still be—a scourge.

A scourge also may be a person, like a tyrant whose actions create havoc and are generally calamitous. Thus Donald Trump is a scourge. So here’s one scourge on another scourge:

May 2018—The Trump Administration disbands the White House pandemic response team.

July 2019—The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) epidemiologist embedded in China’s disease control agency leaves the post, and the Trump Administration eliminates the role.

22 January 2020—(after Novel Coronavirus samples were taken in Washington state) “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.”

24 January 2020—“China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!”

2 February 2020—“We pretty much shut it down coming in from China.”

7 February 2020—“It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu. This is deadly stuff.”

10 February 2020—“I think the virus is going to be—it’s going to be fine. Looks like by April, you know in theory when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.”

24 February 2020—“The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. The Stock Market starting to look very good to me!”

25 February 2020—“CDC and my Administration are doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus. I think that’s a problem that’s going to go away. They have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we’re very close to a vaccine.”

26 February 2020—“The 15 (cases in the US) within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero. “We’re going very substantially down, not up.”

26 February 2020—“Well, we’re testing everybody that we need to test. And we’re finding very little problem. Very little problem. This is a flu. This is like a flu.”

27 February 2020—“It’s going to disappear. One day, it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”

28 February 2020—“We’re ordering a lot of supplies. We’re ordering a lot of, uh, elements that frankly we wouldn’t be ordering unless it was something like this. But we’re ordering a lot of different elements of medical.”

2 March 2020—“A lot of things are happening, a lot of very exciting things are happening and they’re happening very rapidly.”

4 March 2020—“Now, and this is just my hunch, but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this. Because a lot people will have this and it’s very mild.”

5 March 2020—“I NEVER said people that are feeling sick should go to work. The United States has, as of now, only 129 cases and 11 deaths. We are working very hard to keep these numbers as low as possible!”

6 March 2020—“I think we’re doing a really good job in this country at keeping it down, a tremendous job at keeping it down. You have to be calm. It’ll go away. Anybody right now, and yesterday, anybody that needs a test gets a test. They’re there. And the tests are beautiful. I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. Every one of these doctors said, ‘How do you know so much about this?’ Maybe I have a natural ability. Maybe I should have done that instead of running for president.”

7 March 2020—“No, I’m not concerned at all.”

10 March 2020—“Just stay calm. It will go away.”

11 March 2020—“It goes away. It’s going away. We want it to go away with very, very few deaths. The vast majority of Americans, the risk is very, very low.”

13 March 2020—“I don’t take responsibility at all.”

Of course not . . .