Senior Pentagon officials are holding meetings from different rooms and connecting via teleconference to prevent possible coronavirus exposure. This and other implemented policies were discussed at a press briefing on Monday. At this time, the immediate risk to forces "remains low" — but a vaccine for COVID-19 is still months away.
Across the Department of Defense, policies and practices are being implemented in response to the spread of the virus.
- The United States Navy recently barred the public from attending graduation ceremonies to minimize travel.
- Fort Benning, Ga. has started screening all new recruits.
- The Army's Europe commander, Lt. Gen. Christopher Cavoli, is working remotely over concerns he may have been exposed.
- Secretary of Defense Mark Esper has started to host large meetings in several separate rooms within the Pentagon, teleconferencing them together.
"We had a meeting at a senior level that is normally as many people as you can cram into a room for a meeting," said Jonathan Rath Hoffman, Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs. "And we actually broke that out over a number of rooms and did it — the meeting via videoconference between different rooms, in an effort to begin implementing social distancing among the senior leadership."
Social distancing refers to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's recommendation that individuals stand no closer than six feet apart in social settings.
But Brig. Gen. Paul Friedrichs, Joint Staff Surgeon for the Joint Chiefs of Staff emphasized that the risk level to military operations remains low.
"So to frame this from a medical standpoint, the immediate risk to our force remains low across the force and I want to be very clear about that," Friedrichs said. "We've had a handful of cases around the world. No one is seriously ill at this point, everyone that has been diagnosed is being appropriately treated, getting the care that they need."
As of Monday morning, the Department of Defense was operating 12 testing labs and seven new active-duty personnel were "under investigation" for COVID-19 exposure — but Friedrichs emphasized that this number would likely change.
The DoD is also preparing to receive passengers from the Grand Princess cruise ship — currently being held off the coast of California — at four quarantine installations in California, Texas, and Georgia. As is the case with all DoD quarantine facilities, DoD is providing the facilities but the Department of Health and Human Services is engaging directly with quarantined individuals.
"Again, the Department of Defense is just providing the facilities, the single-room requirement and the individual bathroom that is associated with that. Because the folks are actually secluded in those rooms," said Robert Salesses, deputy assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense and defense support of civil authorities. "The meals are brought to their room, they have the HHS employs doctors and medical professionals to check on them. If they see something, then obviously they're taken to medical care and HHS is responsible for moving them on to the additional medical care if needed."
And while Walter Reed Army Institute of Research is working to research and develop a vaccine and medical counter-measures, it will take time.
"A new vaccine for a new virus, as is the case right now, takes months to develop and then it has to go through safety testing and then it has to through broader testing to see how effective it is," Friedrichs said. "That work is occurring, but I don't have a clear timeline for when we will have a vaccine or medical countermeasures coming out."
In the meantime, installations across the country, as well as senior officials in the Pentagon, will be following the CDC's recommendations — avoid large gatherings, practice social distancing and good hygiene, and reschedule non-essential travel.
"We're encouraging everybody to practice good social distancing, use their judgment, within the bounds of what we can do to continue to do the job," Hoffman said. "We can continue to do this while practicing good risk prevention measures."
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