Public health nonfeasance, misfeasance and malfeasance in the U.S. government response to COVID-19

In the midst of the political leadership crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, a framework of public health nonfeasance, misfeasance and malfeasance is described in order to define, categorize and understand the various forms of public health performance failure of the U.S. government during the COVID-19 outbreak response thus far. The framework in turn prompts a number of critical ethical and legal questions whose consideration are in the nation's current and future public health interest, as the nation struggles to engage effective disease control measures to reduce spread of this, and future, pandemics.