Exclusive: Pentagon orders halt to overseas movement for U.S. forces for up to 60 days over coronavi

[mfcorey1]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Mark Esper has issued a stop movement order to the U.S. military halting all travel and movement abroad for up to 60 days in an effort to limit the spread of the coronavirus through the ranks, Esper told Reuters on Wednesday.

Esper said in an interview that the order applied to all U.S. forces, civilian personnel and families, but noted that there would be some exceptions.


"The purpose is to make sure that we're not bringing the virus back home, infecting others, that we're not spreading it around the military," Esper said.

The measure is by far the most sweeping to date and will affect forces around the world. Esper said one exception to the order would be the drawdown under way in Afghanistan, which will continue.

The United States has said it is committed to reducing the number of its troops in Afghanistan to 8,600 within 135 days of signing the deal with the Taliban last month.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/exclusive-pentagon-orders-halt-to-overseas-movement-for-us-forces-for-up-to-60-days-over-coronavirus/ar-BB11HIoW?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=mailsignout

[SuprstitionAintthWay]

1. Militaries will be the 1st to create units of infected-&-recovered, therefore immune, troops.

And will deploy them in the place of units containing any personnel who have not yet contracred and recovered from covid. (Until, of course, such time as immunity by vaccination becomes available. Then vaccinating all troops will replace this stop-gap strategy.)

Significant numbers of such soldiers who are deployable anywhere should start becoming available within just a few months.

Germany's top epidemiologist, not beholden to our political pressure here to soft-peddle grim realities, says no vaccine is likely until 2021. He projects that 60% to 70% of Germans will get covid-19. There will be the %'s of deaths that we all are starting to learn. But, of course, the vast majority will beat the disease from adequately to very well, and come out on the other side both immune and non-infectious to others. Those people will reach 60 to 70% of national populations, at which point herd immunity will reduce the risk to the remaining 30 or 40%. Meanwhile more effective treatments will be developed to help those seriously stricken with covid to survive at higher rates. (To the extent, that is, that hospitals are able to help with the new treatments the large numbers who will be stricken.)

The above, Germany's top epidemiologist thinks, will probably be how covid-19 plays out. And I notice I don't hear many other experts stepping up and explicitly arguing otherwise.

If this is to be the case, it will become increasingly apparent to all that herd immunity from the immune-through-contraction is our course. And that those growing numbers of people will also be the people biologically best suited to start getting our world moving back towards fully operating again.

Immune and non-infectious citizens and employees are what the whole world needs. If the German epidemiologist is correct, majorities of nations' populations are going to become just that, before a vaccine is available, through immunity by infection-and-recovery.

Militaries are all about readiness to meet threats. They vigorously pursue the lowest possible mortality for their own troops. They employ many strategists and planners. And personnel-wise are best suited to adjust in this manner. So I expect militaries, ours and others, to jump on this concept earliest. Both out of necessity, and because troops are young, healthy, and will pass through their coming covid infections safely at the highest rates.


(The medical world would be 1st to institute such a shift IF they had enough personnel to progressively phase their still-susceptible staff out of contact with patients. But their "front line" is the whole globe right now, and they have very insufficient "troops" fighting the covid war already. They just won't be able to pull non-immune doctors, nurses, techs and aides off of those front lines. For them this will remain an "all hands, plus" struggle until it's nearly over.)