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Who's In Charge During the Ebola Crisis?
Lasrick writes: Epidemics test the leadership skills of politicians and medical infrastructures, which is clear as this article goes through the different ways West African countries have dealt with the Ebola crisis. Now that fears are spreading about a U.S. outbreak (highly unlikely, as this article points out), it may be time to look at the U.S. medical infrastructure, which, of course, in many ways is far superior to those West African countries where the virus has spread. But there is an interesting twist to how disease outbreaks are handled in the U.S.: "The U.S. Constitution—written approximately 100 years before the germ theory of disease was proven by French chemist Louis Pasteur and German physician Robert Koch — places responsibility for public health squarely on the shoulders of local and state political leaders ... one could argue that the United States is hobbled by an outdated constitution in responding to epidemics. State and local jurisdictions vary tremendously in their public health capabilities."
Because he is in line.
Everything is fine.
It's whoever has the most guns! In case of a tie, hand sanitizer and lysol can be used as a tie breaker.
"general welfare" as part of the spending power section is all that congress
needs to craft well considered laws.
Federal agencies could be funded to establish top level technical resources.
States could then move forward.
Emergencies open doors as well....
As scary as Ebola is it may not qualify as an emergency we have
common problems from influenza, food poisoning, pneumonia that
kill more...
However congress could declare Ebola in Africa and others problems
as a health risk to the US and fund emergency actions.
My gut reaction is if citizens were to take personal responsibility
and act on all the common influenza, food handling, common cold
basic sanitation programs Ebola would vanish only to be found in
footnotes referencing a small number of individuals and hospitals in
the US. Sadly Africa is still behind the eight ball in this disaster.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
>> Who's In Charge During the Ebola Crisis?
Ebola is.
Everyone knows that Dr. Nancy Snyderman is on the job and in charge. Soup for everyone!
Who's in charge?
WHO's in charge.
In the US, the people in charge are still the health insurance companies. They will call the shots during this situation just as they have for decades (including during the writing of the 2010 "health care reform" bill). They will dictate who gets which care, and who gets to die in which ways. The 26 year old nurse in TX has probably already had her policy cancelled for a pre-existing condition (ie, she was alive and hence had the potential to be infected with ebola in her hazardous occupation).
Just wait until the insurance companies quietly release their 2014 profit reports in another year or two and we see how handsomely we rewarded their top executives for this.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The USA has handled many epidemics in the past. The experience of Western Samoa vs. American Samoa during the Spanish Flu epidemic is an interesting example. The TL;DR: version: Western Samoa decided they couldn't stopping the importation of plantation laborers, and as a result 20-25% of the population died. American Samoa self-quarantined, and nobody died.
One of the core problems today is that the CDC has lost focus, and instead of controlling infectious disease, they spend money things like playground safety, workplace accidents, guns, and birth defects. And then there was the NIH grant to study why gay men are often thin and lesbians are often obese.
We don't need to change the Constitution, just the spending and research priorities of a bunch of bureaucracies.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
Ebola is in charge during an Ebola crisis.
Well its either the World Health Organization or Peter Capaldi.
Not just ebola, but one could argue that the United States is hobbled by an outdated constitution in responding to a wide variety of modern day issues. For example, airports and borders, traveller's rights, electronic surveillance, intellectual property rights, and a host of other issues.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Control the outbreak with 4 simple steps.
1. If you are there you are staying there.
2. If you go there you are staying there.
3. If you try to leave we (the world, but primarily the US of course) kill you with fire.
4. Focus all the worlds efforts on the people there.
Result: The outbreak is wholly contained and either runs through it supply of isolated/quarantined people or the focus of immense resources stops it.
Everything else is political bullshit and pussy fucktwit hand-waving.
Thousands are dead. Thousands more will die. And Billions are at risk, not because of a problem but because of lack of will.
--habit
There has been one case of Ebola transmitted in the U.S. Isn't it a wee bit early to be writing an epitaph for the Constitution? Especially since none of that crap was part of TFA?
TFA's commentary on patient zero being sent home with a bottle of antibiotics (for a virus, of course) was spot on though. That's what happens when you insist on running healthcare as a business.
Is sleep deprivation an early stage symptom?
Seastead this.
That's what trial by jury is for.
Nope. SCOTUS says "Can't have; not yours."
http://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/committees/adr/articles/winter2013-032713-federal-arbitration-act.html
the U.S. Supreme Court sent a clear message to all state courts that the Federal Arbitration Act precludes any interference with arbitration proceedings based upon valid arbitration agreements, even if those proceedings seek to enforce a contract provision that violates state law
You no longer deserve a day in court even if the health insurance contract is prima-facie illegal. There is good reason that more people with life-threatening illnesses are appealing to the court of public opinion for their fights with the insurance companies...
What are the options for the USA?
Got that negative pressure or half-facepiece respirator ready, full facepiece or hood or helmet per medial team member?
Or is the just in time supply track on the way with more expensive kit?
How many negative-pressure airborne infection isolation rooms are ready per city, state?
With all that potential for aerosolising fluids the infection-control teams really have to start thinking fast per city.
Home stay with a box of food and expert medical care visit per home per city?
Big new tent outside a regional teaching hospital? Your local Care Camp is ready too ie a drip and a camp bed.
Then you have the contractors to clean up the used camp bed and get that hermetically sealed casket.
The legal system is ready per state. The expert camp contractors are ready to feed, wash, clean and care for huge numbers of people at short notice. The caskets have always been ready.
The only question is are people ready to stay home, hope that powered air-purifying respirator was fitted correctly every day for all staff or wait for the legal order to get ready for that local camp?
So dont worry, the state and federal legal system will get people into well funded camps. The contractors have all the quality hermetically sealed caskets needed per camp.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Did the guy who entered the White House recently and spit on all the furniture have Ebola! Uh Oh! For the Democratic High Command! Dead bodies. Yea! Good for us. Citizens of the U.S.A.
Only if the president then chairs a join session of Congress and sneezes on everyone.
Learn to love Alaska
"The U.S. Constitution—written approximately 100 years before the germ theory of disease was proven by French chemist Louis Pasteur and German physician Robert Koch — places responsibility for public health squarely on the shoulders of local and state political leaders"
Tell that to our President and the Congressional representatives that enacted the ACA. And the Supreme Court that then remade it into a tax.
It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
And here are the World Health Organization's regularly updated situation reports:
http://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/situation-reports/en/
Growth rate is down to 87%, that's from 100% last month and 133% the month before.
At 87% population growth rate, it would consume the world in about 3 years...
-=/\- Jizzbug -/\=-
Without a top-down bureaucracy calling the shops, states can try 50 different methods to control the pandemic, and compare results to see who has the best one. They're not stuck mindlessly doing what Washington has dictated, even if it's wrong.
The CDC is swearing up and down Ebola can be transmitted by airborne infection, but what if they're wrong about this strain?
The federal government is much more likely than the states to continue a wrong course of action long after it's been proven a bad idea than the states. See also: Welfare, agribusiness subsidies, the food pyramid...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Director: Xavier Onassis.
Have gnu, will travel.
Yep. Where I work, we train first responders, mayors, governors and all sorts of people regarding their roles in an emergency.
The states have their roles, the cities and county health departments and leadership have theirs, as do the hospitals, etc, and the CDC and others at the federal level.
What we don't need us a mandate that everything has to be done through a federal agency, maybe via ebola.healthcare.gov.
One interesting drill that covers not only infectious disease but also riot is the zombie drill. In the drill, their is a microbe that turns people into zombies. Healthcare workers practice inoculating a lot of people in a hurry, while treating those already infected. City managers and the like practice communications with FEMA,CDC, and other agencies to get the needed information and resources, public information officials stand in front of our TV cameras and practice getting the most important information out in a clear manner, etc. Instructors watch everything via one-way mirrors and record all phone calls, then review the students' performance.
Now, several Republican members of Congress demand that the President immediately designate an "Ebola Czar". The hypocrisy is extreme. On Oct 4, 2014, Rep. Kingston told the Washington Examiner: "Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., said Saturday that while he "hate[s] to invoke the term 'czar,'" President Obama needs one to combat the spread of the deadly Ebola virus."
Meanwhile, Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) issued a statement (flash required) on Oct 3, 2014 that criticized the President:
To be clear, when Kingston, Burr (and Sen. John McCain, R-AZ, and others) urges fast action to put someone in charge, he can't mean confirming someone through the Senate, which takes months or even more than a year.
Final related note: The position of US Surgeon General has limited powers and would not be the supreme leader on Ebola. Still, it would not hurt to have someone in the job, and that person can play a key role communicating with the public. However, the US has no confirmed, permanent Surgeon General because the NRA is blocking the Senate confirmation of President Obama's nominee, Dr. Vivek Murthy. He is an MD and an MBA. He practices and teaches at Brigham and Women's Hospital and teaches at Harvard Medical School. He cofounded a clinical trials company, and an HIV education organization. But he supports an assault weapons ban and tweeted that he thinks guns are a health care issue. So the NRA's opposition means his nomination will never come to a vote. It is dead. Even if one disagrees with Dr. Murthy's position on guns, he has no power over guns whatsoever, and it's reasonable that a President get his people if they are more or less qualified and mainstream (not hacks or crazy radicals). Republicans are right to seek smaller government in some places. But to just throw the monkey wrench in the gears of government for political gain is not constructive. It's just politics.
from the commentary linked in the summary:
"Single-payer." Like the VA. Because unaccountable, lying government officials and patients dying while on fake waiting lists are exactly what we need during an ebola epidemic.
And Obamacare. Because of Obamacare I can not afford medical care. My premiums are about 3x before Obamacare. My deductible is $5,000.00. I am taxed $300.00/month on my health insurance because I am employed at a small company which can not purchase the plan directly from an insurer. (Obamacare revokes the tax exemption for employer-subsidized health insurance.) I am buying the least-expensive plan mandated by Obamacare to avoid the penalty and paying about $1,300.00 per month in insurance and taxes. I had a shoulder injury, went to an in-network doctor and had to pay for the entire visit, treatment and the physical therapy myself.
To summarize, now, because of Obamacare, I am required by law to pay $1,300.00 per month for health insurance and taxes at a minimum and on top of that I have to pay for my own medical expenses. Because of Obamacare, unless I am absolutely certain that I am dying I will not be going anywhere near a health care provider. By both making the patients poorer with higher insurance premiums and by raising the cost of treatment with higher deductibles Obamacare has created a massive financial disincentive to seeing medical care during an epidemic. And then also there is the decreased access to health care because of shrinking provide networks.
In addition to advocating for evidently broken and corrupt systems, the author wants to re-write the Constitution. You know, that document which guarantees citizens rights. What could possibly go wrong?
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
One could argue that the United States is hobbled by an outdated constitution in responding to epidemics.
One could argue that, but one would be wrong. It's such a foolish, sensationalist, clickbaity thing to say that it obviates the need to even look at TFA.
The federal government, and specifically the executive, have constitutional authority to handle crises like an epidemic, coordinate a nationwide response, declare martial law, etc etc, whatever is necessary to address an existential threat. It's not even controversial. You'd get more pushback on renaming post offices
Yes, states have sovereign powers, and there are situations where that creates conflict. This is not one of those situations. If shit gets real (Outbreak style, though ebola isn't airborne), have not a shred of doubt that the CDC will take point and the US Army will roll in if need be. And the states will welcome them with open arms, because states do not have CDCs, or armies, or nationwide strategic stockpiles of medical supplies, or warzone-sized containment apparatus, or the world's best repurposed contact tracing agency, the NSA.
Next issue.
Nothing posted to
We've had many epidemics in the US. We've had scarlet fever, tuberculosis, cholera, typhus, polio, dengue, malaria, leprosy, influenza named after various places and creatures... the list is endless.
The problem is the CDC lost focus. With a relative lack of communicable diseases for going on five decades, like all bureaucracies with not enough to do they started expanding their portfolio to include lots of things you wouldn't think belong under "disease control" and took their eye off the ball. Now that we have a bona fide health threat all they know how to do is hold press conferences telling us not to worry.
The one thing the CDC doesn't need is more power and money. They already have broad emergency powers, and if they have enough money to do gun control studies and lesbian weight gain studies they already have too much money.
As a side note, the director would be a lot easier to support if he wasn't obviously lying when he says there's nothing to worry about. We're not children, buddy, so don't treat us like children. Obviously this strain of Ebola is quite a bit more contagious than earlier strains, and it falls in about the middle of the lethality range normal for that disease (20%-80%). We should be restricting travel from affected countries, and anyone coming in from those countries should be quarantined for 21 days.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
bowman you what a fluid is same. You cannot be careful how comfortably Ketone Slim XT
>"one could argue that the United States is hobbled by an outdated constitution in responding to epidemics. State and local jurisdictions vary tremendously in their public health capabilities."
One could also argue that this is EXACTLY the way it is supposed to be. USA States are SUPPOSED to have control over most of what happens in their area and not be puppets to a huge, inefficient, out-of-touch, expensive, slow, borderline fascist, federal government overloard.
Someone is taking you for a ride. That's not even approaching what I'm paying, $600/month, and this is for a plan *far* from being the least-expensive plan for mandated coverage: %100 coverage ( $0 deductible for in-plan doctors ), and an expenditure account. I'd suggest trying to find out who's lying to you. The average price of a "bronze" plan across states for someone in their 40's is like, $350/mo.. and a platinum plan is like, $500. If your premiums really are that high, the "lying" may be somewhere less obvious. Research to see if your state did something stupid with the implementations that screwed it's citizens, and direct complaints there.
"I am taxed $300.00/month on my health insurance because I am employed at a small company which can not purchase the plan directly from an insurer" I'm not even sure what this is saying. This was removed for all businesses, not just small businesses. All employees are now taxed on the income that used to be "pre-tax" income used to buy health insurance. If a business is somehow hiding the cost of health insurance for it's employees and not reporting it as income, that's illegal AKAIK.
In any case, trying to wrap that into the "cost of your insurance" as an extra $300/mo seems pretty disingenuous to me.
The R-naught of two only applies in the terra typica where roads don't exist. We knoe know it's on the skin and can live for hours on say, a touch screen. Like apartment buildings have. Like the one I'm in. Where health care workers live. Across the road from a suspect Ebola Zaise case in Ontario whowalked in from Sierre Leone and DID NOT BRING ME A KILLIFISH.
I'm gonna pretend I"m in charges cause I think I figured this out. Do you lke puzzles? Let's find out:
http://www.documentation.ird.f...
What do fruit bats and man have in common? It says right in the paper, bone up, there'll be a quiz.
Need Mercedes parts ?
16 people outside of Africa, every continent except antarctica. at least 2 are unreported as well as of monday midnight.
Need Mercedes parts ?
Somebody on Fox is *asking* for Fema camps now.
I am not making this up.
Need Mercedes parts ?
The viruses.
They say now it's on the skin and fluids don't matter, also it lived for several hours. Bleach kills it.
Now about all those touch screens in lobbies and elevators and...
Need Mercedes parts ?
"Damn liberals, wanting waste money on Ebola research that only black people get."
I don't think you understand public health policy. And this is your job? Wow.
Need Mercedes parts ?
I know schizophrenia when I see it.
You need to get some help buddy. People will want to talk to you again if you do it. When you're tired of this, go.
Need Mercedes parts ?
tag!
Need to type accents and special characters in Windows? Use FrKeys
Without a top-down bureaucracy calling the shops, states can try 50 different methods to control the pandemic, and compare results to see who has the best one. They're not stuck mindlessly doing what Washington has dictated, even if it's wrong.
The CDC is swearing up and down Ebola can be transmitted by airborne infection, but what if they're wrong about this strain?
The federal government is much more likely than the states to continue a wrong course of action long after it's been proven a bad idea than the states. See also: Welfare, agribusiness subsidies, the food pyramid...
People who do these things for a living in real life would disagree with you.
By the time you try 50 different methods and compare the results, the epidemic will be all over (or out of control, depending on your luck). Why don't we disband Homeland Security and let 50 states deal with the terrorists in their own way?
If you have a mysterious disease spreading across the country, such as the spinal infections caused by the contaminated injections distributed by the New England Compounding Center last year, it's a lot harder for a state agency to figure out what's going on from 2 or 3 cases than it is for the CDC to figure out what's going on from 2-300 cases. And it turned out that the NECC was regulated by the states, not the federal government. After the disaster, everybody involved decided that maybe the federal government should have a little more oversight in this matter.
But even if you were right, unfortunately the (Republican, tax-cutting) states have been disbanding the very state health agencies that did such good reporting work on the New England Compounding Center disaster. I remember years ago California had a great occupational safety and health department, which was identifying how workers were dying and figuring out ways to stop it. They found that the major cause of electrocutions were (1) boom trucks hitting overhead wires, which could be prevented by just warning drivers about the hazard, and (2) short circuits in power tools, which could be prevented with a 25-cent ground fault interrupter. CAL OSHA was disbanded by Ronald Reagan.
from the commentary linked in the summary:
"Single-payer." Like the VA. Because unaccountable, lying government officials and patients dying while on fake waiting lists are exactly what we need during an ebola epidemic.
I have read studies published by the VA on the outcomes of people treated at different VA hospitals for conditions like prostate cancer colorectal cancer, and I've talked to VA doctors. The VA has some of the best outcomes in the world. They did some of the major studies in cardiology to find out what works and what doesn't work, and every cardiologist in the world follows the recommendations of the VA studies. If I had cancer or a heart attack, I would be confident in any major VA hospital. (Although like all health care providers, they do have problems in rural areas.)
The reason they had that problem with waiting list fraud (which is unexcusable) is that their managers gave them politically-mandated targets for appointments, without giving them the money that they needed to hire more doctors to meet those targets. (Would you have predicted any problems with that?) That's what corporate-style management by financial incentives gets you. Now they're giving them more money to hire doctors.
But it doesn't affect their main purpose, which is to save the lives and health of veterans, many of whom have service-related injuries. In rehabilitation medicine, they've been doing a great job since at least WWII. I know a lot of veterans in their 70s and 80s who go to the VA and are very happy with it. You're seeing a doctor who is on salary and trying to treat you with the best possible medicine, not a doctor who gets 10 minutes to see you and gets paid for the procedures he does on you, even if they do more harm than good.
And Obamacare. Because of Obamacare I can not afford medical care. My premiums are about 3x before Obamacare. My deductible is $5,000.00. I am taxed $300.00/month on my health insurance because I am employed at a small company which can not purchase the plan directly from an insurer. (Obamacare revokes the tax exemption for employer-subsidized health insurance.) I am buying the least-expensive plan mandated by Obamacare to avoid the penalty and paying about $1,300.00 per month in insurance and taxes. I had a shoulder injury, went to an in-network doctor and had to pay for the entire visit, treatment and the physical therapy myself.
To summarize, now, because of Obamacare, I am required by law to pay $1,300.00 per month for health insurance and taxes at a minimum and on top of that I have to pay for my own medical expenses. Because of Obamacare, unless I am absolutely certain that I am dying I will not be going anywhere near a health care provider. By both making the patients poorer with higher insurance premiums and by raising the cost of treatment with higher deductibles Obamacare has created a massive financial disincentive to seeing medical care during an epidemic. And then also there is the decreased access to health care because of shrinking provide networks.
In addition to advocating for evidently broken and corrupt systems, the author wants to re-write the Constitution. You know, that document which guarantees citizens rights. What could possibly go wrong?
I am no fan of Obama or Obamacare, which was designed on a Republican model (Romneycare) and on a proposal put out by the Heritage Foundation, which now denies it.
And how do you like those free-market insurance company bureaucracies? Good thing you don't have to deal with government bureaucracies like Medicare.
The big problem with Obamacare is that, instead of expanding Medicare, as the progressives wanted, it gives the insurance companies about 30% of your health care premium, and that's the main reason why i
"It's really hard to catch, there has to be intimate contact."
Caught by medical staff despite the best isolation efforts of first world medical teams, and by a Deputy after visiting an infected man's home.
Something tells me either we're being lied to or this outbreak is just naturally more contagious than previous outbreaks and the leadership haven't recognised this yet.
per-existing condition the jail / prison will cover you as they don't have that in there plan.
yeah, well, i won't give the penguins at the bronx zoo long to live.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
My best shot at a response is: probably no one is going to drop infectious ebola waste on Louisianans as punishment for being racists.
Probably?
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
without serious medical issues. After that they go on America's socialized medicine program, Medicare. This is by design. The elderly are not profitable to insure and are reliant on health care. They would demand socialized medicine one way or the other. This keeps them from becoming a voting block for broad scale Single Payer healthcare
Now, if you're one of those Americans without a great job and with a bunch of health problems, yeah, you're in for a world of hurt. But by then you're heavily marginalized. You're much too busy surviving to vote...
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and making under $150k/yr wouldn't trade it for private insurance. And we all go single payer at 65 unless we're making 10 times that. While I'm on the subject, I've never met a Canadian or Britain who would trade their health care for ours.
And what world do you live in where Obamacare is single payer? It isn't even close. It's an awful compromise created when the insurance companies spent half a billion dollars in _one_ year flooding every possible media channel with stories of death panels for Grandma (who, ironically, is already on Medicare, a single payer system). It's the best we can get with the current political system and folks like yourself with an irrational fear of a system that works great everywhere else in the world.
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Yeah, the exact same interns, 20 years later! After the fat chicks turned into dykes.
Copyright (c) 1990 - 2014 Dice. All rights reserved. Use of this comment is subject to certain Terms and Conditions.
The simple solution is that the states just seed control over this particular problem to the feds. There's nothing stopping state legislatures from passing laws that allow federal jurisdiction in this area. All the constitution does is say the states can decide for themselves. There's plenty of reason for the ruling. What if the feds tried to "Cure" ethnic heritage like the Germans did?
"The bug stops here". I saw it in a photo once.
Admiral Boris Lushniak (US Surgeon General), Dr. Wanda Jones, and Slvia Burwell would be in charge.
At the risk of being considered a conspiricy nut.. I gotta funny feeling this is all in the plan.. Nationwide problem, therefore the problem gets "nationalized".. A perfect excuse for martial law.. The shitstain currently in the Whitehouse has been praying to Allah/Satan for just such an excuse. I expect the announcement any day now..
Since I know I'll get modded down by the majority of Communist/Liberals who infest /. I'll put this right here.. I'm neither an (R) or a (D) (shudder).... I'm A FUCKING AMERICAN and I'm sick and tired of the road this country is going down... The road is soon to be REALLY REALLY bumpy......
THANK YOU, Edward Snowden!! Americans owe you a debt of gratitude (whether they know it or not..)
We blamed all the evil fat white Republicans. We're done. Go home and wait for Dear Leader to declare Zombie Martial Law.
The Republicans have been blocking the appointment of a new U.S. Surgeon General because of guns. The NRA doesn't want anyone to know that guns are a health hazard.
Also, the Republicans have gutted funding for the CDC Emergency Response (down about 50% in the past few years).
So, Republicans are very bad for your health.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Most of the appointments Bush made were confirmed by the Senate. Almost all of Obama's were not.
Do you have a source you can link to? Are you saying most of the "czars" appointed by Bush were eventually confirmed?
There is nothing hypocritical in urging the President to put someone in charge as long as he works with the Senate.
When you say "he works with the Senate", do you mean: As long as the appointee is eventually confirmed by the Senate?
Thank you for clarifying.
Good point. The Acting Surgeon General sounds very qualified. I understand the position's powers are limited, and CDC takes the lead.
American style health care why not move here? That's one thing that we win out in. If you've got tons of money our health care is great. As someone who's had family who are only alive today because of socialized medicine though I find our system terrible. We've let people die for lack of health care.
Then again, grass is always greener.
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This article is advertising for a book. The only prompt on the question of who is a brief "This might explain why the question, âoeWhoâ(TM)s in charge?â is inevitably asked after failures in response to public health crises." And that question is a link to CNN asking the question. And it is answered there:
The linked article at thebulletin.org is tilting towards using this to push for universal insurance/healthcare, not even remotely pushing for a universal dictator like you claim. Most importantly, there is no support for the claim "The US Constitution ... places responsibility for public health squarely on the shoulders of local and state political leaders." This is frequently argued, but it relies on interpretations of phrases like "provide for" and "general welfare".
The article is clearly written for a specific audience, one that is impressed by the number of hyperlinks without reading what is linked. Blame the author, and blame the idiots who buy her horseshit. But mostly blame yourself for inferring something that isn't really there. OP cherry picked bits of the article to create something that it seems even the author didn't mean to convey.