European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels, March 17, 2020. – AFP
The President of the European Commission has admitted that politicians have all “underestimated” the extent of the danger posed by the epidemic of the new coronavirus, in an interview published Wednesday by the German daily Bild.
“I think all of us who are not experts initially underestimated the coronavirus,” Ursula von der Leyen told the newspaper. “But in the meantime it has become clear that this is a virus that will keep us busy for a long time,” added the president of the European executive. “We have understood that all these measures, which two or three weeks ago seemed drastic and draconian, should be taken now,” she said, recalling that Europe was “at the moment the epicenter of the crisis”.
“Even more underestimated in the United States”
However, she refuted the term “war” against the virus used this week by Emmanuel Macron. “Personally, I would not use the term war but I understand the motivation of the French president because the coronavirus is a worrying adversary,” said the president of the Commission.
According to the German Minister for the Economy, Donald Trump’s United States took the virus even more lightly at the outset than in Europe. “The onset of the crisis was probably even more underestimated in the United States than in some European countries,” Peter Altmaier told German regional news group Funke on Wednesday.
“This is the reason why we very much hope that the United States succeeds in controlling the situation, also in our own interest”, he added, stressing that “nobody can wish that this economy falls into a recession uncontrolled ”.
