By Chris Satullo

What if a President of the United States had delivered the following televised address to the nation last Feb. 1?

 (Yes, hindsight is 20-20 and all that.  But no fact or idea in this speech would have been unknown or unknowable to a competent president of the United States on Feb. 1.)

My fellow Americans,

I’ve asked to speak to you tonight to inform you about an urgent threat to our nation’s welfare and the lives of many of our citizens. Perhaps millions of them.

It is a threat we can still blunt and contain, if we take some swift but challenging actions. If we don’t, future generations may look back at how we reacted in this moment and say, in sadness and grief,  “What were you thinking? Why didn’t you do more?”

I view this threat as real and urgent, based on the emerging scientific evidence and firm advice from the smartest experts in this land.

This threat has no face. It has no nationality. It brandishes no weapon systems. To this point, it does not even have a specific name. But, make no mistake, it is lethal and it is coming for us.

It is a virus.

In some people, this virus might not seem like much. That is part of what makes it so insidious, what enables it to spread so swiftly, to leap oceans and invade regions in silence. For some, it may arrive in the camouflage of a mild cold. While those folks shrug off their symptoms and go about their daily business, they help the virus spread. With every cough, sneeze or touch of a public surface, they help the virus leap to new targets.

Others whom the virus reaches, it makes very sick. And some, it kills – an agonizing death in which the virus steals their very breath, making their respiratory system shut down.

We know all this because we see it happening right now in the Wuhan, the largest city in China’s Hubei province. We see the swiftness with which the virus has spread suffering among the people there. We see the measures the Chinese government has needed to take to curb the virus’ spread.

A lot of times, when a terrible thing happens somewhere on our globe – a landslide, an earthquake, a cyclone – we watch the news footage, say a prayer for the victims, perhaps send a check to the Red Cross. But we don’t see any way the tragedy affects us directly.

This is different. Very different. Wuhan is not the only or the last place this virus will invade. It’s just the first we know about.

Two days ago, the World Health Organization declared this virus a global pandemic. Since then, my administration has been in constant communication with officials there. Also, we’ve consulted America’s best experts in epidemiology, the science of how diseases spread. 

Here’s what they’ve told me: The virus is coming to our shores. This is certain. That is what the word pandemic means – an illness with global reach. Our urgent task now is to take – swiftly – the steps that our experts say will enable us to contain the virus’ spread within our borders and to mitigate the suffering in those American places where it hits.

Based on the best data and advice available, here are the steps I have taken or will take soon. In a moment, I’ll list the steps you should take, immediately, to keep yourself, your loved ones and your community as safe as possible.

Each of these is designed to make sure America stands in history as a land that faced a serious threat and contained it, minimizing suffering and death. We do not want to be a place that shrugged and dithered, causing hundreds of thousands to die needlessly.

As of tonight, I am suspending all travel from the U.S. to China. I’m barring from entering  from China anyone who doesn’t have a valid U.S. passport work or student visa. Those who do travel from China will be tested for the virus and quarantined if positive. Other travel restrictions to other viral hotspots may follow, as the facts dictate.

This step is only prudent, but please don’t imagine that it protects us sufficiently from the virus.

So, here are other steps I’ve taken:

• I’ve asked the Secretary of Health and Human Services to lead an urgent collaboration with state and county health officials, and the private sector, to make a reliable test for the virus widely available, as soon as possible. This is important not only to individuals showing symptoms of the virus, which include sore throat, dry cough and fever.  By quarantining those who test positive, we can slow the virus’ spread. What’s more, accurate, widespread testing gives us invaluable, real-time data to inform our strategies to counter pandemic.
• I’ve asked Congress for an emergency appropriation of $1 billion to fuel development and testing of a vaccine for this virus. But understand, even if we do this in record time, a vaccine would only be available by this time next year. There is no magic cure that will spare us from taking other, difficult steps.
• This pandemic will test as never before our health system, our hospitals and our brave, skilled health-care workers and first responders. So I’ve asked Congress to approve an emergency $10 billion fund to help hospitals buy needed equipment, set up quarantine areas, train workers, and pay the overtime hours that may be needed. 
• Those hospitals and workers will need equipment such as ventilators and protective items such as N-95 face masks. So, I’m invoking my powers under the Defense Production Act, a law that last came to the nation’s aid after Sept. 11. This means, if need be, I can order companies that make these vital items to prioritize our health system’s needs over other contracts.
• I know you will step up to this challenge. This is what most Americans do in times of crisis. But, sadly, we know some unethical characters will seek to hoard essential items and profiteer off this public health crisis. So let me send those criminals a message: We will find you; we will prosecute and punish you.

Now, here comes a hard but necessary message:

We will have to be very lucky, supremely lucky, to avoid a localized outbreak of the virus somewhere in America. If such an outbreak happens in any town, city or region, we must take very serious actions to contain it. Please listen carefully as I list some of them:

• Quarantining the symptomatic.
• Asking anyone exposed to the virus, whether showing symptoms or not, to self-quarantine – that is, to stay restricted to home for at least 14 days, the time experts say it takes for the virus to show its hand.
• Telling workers non-essential to public health and safety to work from home.
• Closing restaurants, theaters and banning all large public gatherings – meaning conferences, rallies, parades, sports events – for as long as it takes to slow the virus down.

Obviously these steps, when necessary, will cause disappointment and hardship. But it’s my duty to level with you. Such actions, and others, may very well be required as part of a wise strategy to contain this lethal virus.

Just as obviously, such measures would impact people’s livelihoods and businesses’ bottom lines. For that reason, I’ve asked congressional leaders to meet with me here, in the Oval Office, tomorrow to begin to put together smart, bipartisan legislation to address the likely economic impacts of the virus. This would include income protection for America’s workers and capital infusions for America’s businesses, particularly its small businesses. I’m open to any good ideas on this front.

I know, as surely as the sun will rise, that tomorrow some voices will say that I am overreacting or scaremongering for some political purpose.

Let me look you in the eye: I am not. This threat is real, it is lethal and it is urgent. I swore an oath on my family Bible to do all in my power to protect you, our nation and our Constitution.  My words tonight are the most important thing I’ve ever done to uphold that oath.

Please understand. This virus is not “the common cold.” It is not even the flu, which, while familiar to us, something we have vaccines for, still recently killed 61,000 of us in one year,  more Americans than died in the Vietnam War.

Let me share what experts have stressed to me: This virus, whose ways we’re still learning and for which we now have no vaccine, is far more lethal than the flu. Perhaps as much as 10 times more lethal. 

Exposure is most dangerous for people over the age of 60 and people with weak immune systems or respiratory problems. We must protect them. But be clear on this: This virus can strike anyone of any age. It can make you very sick or worse.

We are very much in this together. We need to worry about our own health, for sure, and the health of those we love. But understand, a pandemic attacks communities, not just individuals.  A person you never met, never even saw, could infect you by unwittingly leaving traces of the virus on a public or workplace surface, just as you could do the same to some other poor soul you never met, someone who is a beloved mother, father, sister, brother, grandmother or grandfather.

To stay safe and healthy, you are going to have to rely on the good will and carefulness of strangers, just as they are going to have rely on you. All our fates are linked, no escaping it.

Let me conclude by listing some basic steps you need to adopt immediately, tonight, to help us fight this threat together:

Always, always, always cover your mouth when you cough or sneeze, not with your hand, but the crook of your elbow.

Wash your hands frequently, really wash them, in hot water. I’m told singing Happy Birthday to yourself twice is a good benchmark for how long to wash hands.  (In my case, I’ll do that silently; I never punish those around me by singing out loud.)

Try not to touch your face with any part of your bare hands. That’s how the virus sneaks into you.

These and other tips are laid out on a new website we’ve set up: StayHealthy.gov.

There, you’ll learn about a concept we may soon have to promote, called social distancing. That means: When in public, even outside, stay at least six feet away from other people. Outside sneeze range, in effect. If we need to go to social distancing, that will force broad postponement of most public events and much travel.

I know what I’ve said here will lead to worry and perhaps even shock. Understand that everything I’ve said tonight has been vetted by experts. It’s all meant to keep you, your neighbors and our nation as prepared and safe as possible

We don’t know all we’d like to know, yet, about what this virus can do and how it will spread. But we do know enough to be certain the steps I’ve outlined tonight, for the nation and you personally, are prudent.

We will get through this together, with kindness, cooperation, patience, sacrifice, innovation, respect for fact and science, and a can-do spirit.

Just as previous generations of Americans have done in some many moments of challenge before.

This is our moment, our challenge. We did not seek it. We had no way to predict it. But it is here now. Together, let us rise to meet it.

Thank you and good night.

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Chris Satullo, a civic engagement consultant, is a former editorial page editor/columnist at The Philadelphia Inquirer, and a former vice president/news at WHYY public media in Philadelphia.