in short ... I dont.
Just my thoughts ... I think it was going to be a shit-show regardless, because our response was a failure at the Federal, State, and Local levels. It was evident that we had no plan to respond, and a plan of that/this magnitude is not something that is lost in a year or two. Soooooooo it was a failure of teh Trump admin and virtually every administration previously.
Now ... if your question is "Should we have a Pandemic Response Team?" My answer is a emphatic yes. Their should be guidance, dare I say direction, from the Federal Government down to the States and then down to individual counties on developing a Pandemic Response. The Federal Government should pose to the States the question "What is your plan if XYZ happens?" The Federal Government should provide guidance and use cases/examples, and the States should develop their individual plans with input from County Commissioners, ALL within scope/under the umbrella of guidance from the Fed/CDC/etc.
A lot of folks know that Im in commercial aviation, and provide IT services to pretty much every airline and airport on the planet. Now, we have mostly moved our core systems to AWS, so a impact to one of our core data centers has be drastically mitigated; however, if we were to lose a core node we are still looking at significant flight delays and ground stoppage of flights globally. We have Disaster Recovery Plans for core nodes, regions, down to individual sites and we practice those plans (mostly in table top fashion) annually. The same should apply here. I fully understand that it is complex bordering on impossible, BUT that is why our "Leaders" are elected and paid. They arent elected to politic and pontificate about social bullshit agendas. It should be the duty of every American to ask/demand of their candidates at the Fed/State/Local "Ok, what is your pandemic plan?" If there is a State/Locality that has a gap based on the Fed guidance/use cases, those gaps need to be identified, and either the Fed offers to fill OR the State needs to develop a plan/schedule on how they are going to fill (i.e Gap Analysis)
With all that said ... messaging in a crisis is key. THAT was our next biggest failure. 1) We didnt have a plan 2) It was evident that we were developing a plan on the fly and all interested parties werent aligned and we arguing with each other in front of the media for the world to see. This led to confusion, frustration, and doubt. Otherwise led to a "void" in leadership, and that void was filled with ...... with the mess that we see ourselves in today.
edit: To further expand ... on a previous topic ... I dont believe that the majority of Federal agencies should be led by political appointees but rather multi-member boards much like National Labor Relations Board, Federal Trade Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, Consumer Product Safety Commission, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Political Appointees by their very nature are ... political. These agencies should only answer to the Law, as outlined in the Constitution or laws that have gone through the Legislative branch.