The response to the coronavirus pandemic in the United States has been poor -- too late to respond, too little equipment on hand, no central co-ordination, outright denial by politicians, and so on. It's quite possible that 150,000 people will die of the virus in the coming weeks and months, a shocking outcome that could have been greatly mitigated by a better response, with proper leadership from the White House.
But can we, without disrespecting the victims of the virus, put this in perspective just for a moment? The total number of deaths in the United States for calendar year 2018 was about 2.85 million. So if, Heaven forbid, the coronavirus death toll does indeed reach 150,000, that would be roughly equal to the number that die of all causes every three weeks, year in and year out. I'm slightly surprised that nobody on CNN has pointed this out -- perhaps they think it sounds callous, but that doesn't mean it isn't true.
The 2.8 million Americans who will die from something other than coronavirus this year will leave behind grieving relatives, just as the virus victims do. They just won't get any kind of a sendoff from Wolf Blitzer and his colleagues.
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