President Donald Trump in January was taking action against the spread of coronavirus, "even though I know from hearing from him he didn't see the memo," from Trade Adviser Peter Navarro warning early on of the dangers of a coronavirus pandemic that could kill hundreds of thousands of people, Surgeon General Jerome Adams said Thursday.
"He was doing the right thing anyway," Adams told Fox News' "Fox and Friends," noting that at the same time the memo came out, Trump was instituting a travel ban from China.
Trump's travel order on China came on Jan. 31, two days after Navarro's first memo warning that a pandemic would cost the United States hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars.
"(Trump) also said in his State of the Union address a few days after that memo was dated that this was a concern," said Adams. "What I would say is that people were always very concerned about this virus. It's been very humbling to all of us and we have had to learn and adapt on the fly as we go along. I don't want anyone in America to think that people were just dismissing this, weren't paying attention to it."
Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar "has been leaning into this issue from the very beginning," Adams added. "I want to focus on the positive. And the positive is America is doing the right thing...the 'Stop the Spread' guidelines are working."
Meanwhile, even with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention taking steps to allow some of the nation's essential workers to return to work, there are still several steps that must be taken before the economy can reopen, including quick testing for coronavirus and antibody tests, Adams said.
In addition, Adams said, officials want to see cases start to decline for "ideally two weeks," and then the government wants a public health infrastructure in place so it can follow up on positive tests while isolating case contacts.
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.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.