--- title: "WHO Special Adviser: Trump’s Coronavirus Remarks Were “Incoherent”" description: "A special adviser to the director-general of the WHO roasted U.S. President Donald Trump's response to the global coronavirus outbreak." date: "2020-02-28" modified: "2020-02-28" authors: - name: "Jon Christian" job_title: "Executive Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jonc" url: "https://futurism.com/neoscope/who-special-adviser-trump-coronavirus-incoherent" categories: - "Developments" - "Health & Medicine" - "Medical" - "Pathogens" - "Viruses" tags: - "coronavirus" - "covid19" - "health" - "trump" --- # WHO Special Adviser: Trump’s Coronavirus Remarks Were “Incoherent” ![A special adviser to the director-general of the WHO roasted U.S. President Donald Trump's response to the global coronavirus outbreak.]() *\Image: CNN\* A special adviser to the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO) roasted U.S. President Donald Trump's response to the global coronavirus outbreak [during an appearance]() on MSNBC's "Hardball" this week. "I found most of what he said a little incoherent," said Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, a former health policy adviser in the Obama White House. "You know, \[Trump's\] a guy that admitted that he’s surprised that 25,000 to 69,000 people each year die of the flu. That just tells you how little he actually knows about public health and about the health of the American public." Emanuel was responding to Trump's [dubious Wednesday remarks]() about the COVID-19 outbreak and controversial decision to delegate the response to Vice President Mike Pence, who has a [controversial record]() dealing with public health issues. But Emanuel seemed particularly peeved by Trump's remarks, which he said betrayed a [deep ignorance]() of the science behind the crisis. "He just revealed how ignorant he is about the situation," Emanuel said. "We don’t know how similar or dissimilar this is to the flu." "We know one thing. It is actually more communicable than the flu. It passes between people very, very easily." You can watch the full clip below: https://twitter.com/hardball/status/1232828192039358464 ## Author I'm responsible for editing, assigning, and scouting at Futurism, as well as occasionally writing for the site. That work involves keeping an eye on a wide range of narratives and issues, but over the past few years I've become increasingly interested in how AI is shaping the future of media, the web, and information itself. My day-to-day often involves collaborating on reporting and commentary projects bylined by my colleagues, but I try to find time to do my own reporting as well; stories I've broken for Futurism have been cited by publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Wired, Ars Technica, New York Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, Bloomberg, and more. I grew up in Southern Vermont and attended Vanderbilt University. Prior to Futurism, I contributed to outlets including the Boston Globe, Vice, Wired, Slate, the Atlantic, the Outline, Ars Technica and more, and did stints in farming and food service. I currently live in Brooklyn, New York, and in my free time I enjoy pinball, word games, cycling, running, and music production. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()