in full agreement with you, politicians do not care about the life of their people, they just wait to be re-elected and continue to fill their pockets with money
The way out is to mandate face masks on all public transport. Then allow people back to work slowly starting with essential workers so the masks do not sell out.
And a peak of 25,000 deaths a day for the US sometime in June as well : 1 million dead by August. Is the economic damage worth it to save those lives? ------------------------- I don't think we had much of a choice. Think about what 1 million dead Americans (mostly older people) would do to the housing market in this country? The massive influx of sudden new homes for sale coupled with mortgage defaults would absolutely crater the banks and home prices nationally. Let's not even talk about the surge in life insurance claims that would likely bankrupt numerous insurers. Nursing homes across the country would be bankrupted instantly. Also, out of that 1 million dead Americans, how many leaders of business, academia, research, and government would die? Gotta figure the number would be at least 5,000-10,000 deaths of some of the brightest minds in the US - that is an incredible brain drain on the society...Just how easy is it to replace a 4-star Navy admiral, or a Jeff Bezos, or a Paul Volcker? Also, if we "just let the virus play itself out" we would probably be looking at a slow, rolling, 2 year period of massive infections, uncertainty, and death. How many people are going to fly on planes during that period? Who will sit in stadiums? Who will ride public transport? Under a slow-spread scenario, we truly would be looking at economic collapse as demand was not able to return....thousands of US businesses would go bankrupt, food supply chains would start to collapse, and next thing you know, we would be standing on lines waiting for the national guard to give us our monthly 20 pound bag of rice to feed our families.
Would it really be 1 million dead? No one really knows. I'm sure a lot more would die if we did nothing / went about business as normal. But how many of those people would still be around in 5 years? How about 1 year? Also, a lot of business would not be normal anyway. Would you really want to go on a cruise or vacation with this virus going around?
How about the environmental impact which I’m assuming is positive. That’s gotta be worth something to Mother Nature. Think about the worldwide breather we have given her so far.
Is the economic damage worth it? might depend on the agenda of the respondent, and when in history the response is given.