Create a COVID-19 commission, say former members of President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology

Drawing on their experience as members of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) during the Obama Administration, Christopher Chyba and colleagues make the case for the development of a non-partisan U.S COVID-19 commission to examine the pandemic outbreak and recommend steps to ensure that the United States responds more effectively in future epidemics. “The task of a non-partisan COVID-19 Commission will be to produce a clear-eyed assessment of why and how the United States fared so poorly in this pandemic, as well as how particular successes were achieved,” write the authors. There is strong precedent for such a group; in the past, the U.S. congress has created national commissions for other events that have severely affected lives, including the 9/11 Commission and the House Select Bipartisan Committee on Hurricane Katrina, which critiqued responses to the events to inform future policy. While eight bills proposing a COVID-19 commission have been introduced in Congress and a privately funded nongovernmental “Covid Commission Planning Group” has been formed, little else has been achieved. Here, Chyba et al. discuss how a U.S. COVID-19 Commission could be designed and implemented and offer an outline of the issues that the Commission should evaluate, including the nation’s public health infrastructure, the warnings and origins of the virus, the adequacy of pandemic preparedness, and the response to the arrival of COVID-19 to the U.S. “The Commission should identify how the relevant U.S. institutions can be improved … and better work together to ensure superior outcomes when future pandemics occur, as they surely will,” write Chyba et al.