China not only hid the dangers of the novel coronavirus for a vital five to six weeks, but it was attempting during that time to corner the market in medical personal protective equipment, including masks, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said Monday.
"They were buying large quantities of masks, gloves, goggles, respirators from the rest of the world, at a time when the world was still sleeping with respect to the dangers of the virus," Navarro said on Fox News' "Fox and Friends."
Navarro said that between Jan. 24 and the end of February, China bought 2.2 billion masks.
"Americans are getting infected because they don't have the masks, Italians are dying because they don't' have the masks, healthcare professionals are going down," said Navarro. "I think if those statistics are telling a story about basically going out and trying to corner the world market and PPE when they knew the dangers and didn't tell the rest of the world, then I think that's a significant discussion we need to have, at least after this is all over because that's a serious matter."
Navarro, who has been put in charge of policy related to the Defense Production Act, said he has not been involved in discussions of legal action against China in response to restrictions of medical supplies.
China has promised it would not restrict exports of medical supplies hours after a New York Post report that the Trump administration was weighing legal action against Beijing for such actions.
Meanwhile, now is the "most crucial part of the war" against coronavirus in New York and New Jersey, and "we are throwing everything we can at it in a tactical and strategic way," Navarro said.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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