In his Reddit AMA, the expert answers the question asked in the poll: (by the way his US casualty prediction is 1.4-2.8 millions) MTOsterholm Verified Specialist - Infectious Diseases I touched on this question in a New York Times op ed I co-authored on March 27th. (Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/27/opinion/coronavirus-trump-testing-shortages.html) Here are the first three paragraphs of this piece: "Of all the resources lacking in the Covid-19 pandemic, the one most desperately needed in the United States is a unified national strategy, as well as the confident, coherent and consistent leadership to see it carried out. The country cannot go from one mixed-message news briefing to the next, and from tweet to tweet, to define policy priorities. It needs a science-based plan that looks to the future rather than merely reacting to latest turn in the crisis. Let’s get one thing straight: From an epidemiological perspective, the current debate, which pits human life against long-term economics, presents a false choice. Just as a return to even a new normal is unthinkable for the foreseeable future — and well past Easter, Mr. Trump — a complete shutdown and shelter-in-place strategy cannot last for months. There are just too many essential workers in our intertwined lives beyond the health care field — sanitation workers; grocery clerks, and food handlers, preparers and deliverers; elevator mechanics; postal workers — who must be out and about if society is to continue to function. A middle-ground approach is the only realistic one — and defining what that looks like means doing our best to keep all such workers safe. It also means leadership. Above all, it means being realistic about what is possible and what is not, and communicating that clearly to the American public." old.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fshgv8/im_dr_michael_osterholm_an_expert_in_infectious/ -------------------------- I said a similar thing earlier, after a while the leadership will realize they can not quarantine a huge country forever and they will let most of the workforce back to work as soon as the overflowing of the hospitals can be avoided. But there still will be plenty dead...
Sure but we still can't explain the German and Japan conundrum. Japan's density is one of the highest, yet their death rate is very low.
Looks like Japan was just behind the curve, and catching up quickly.They have declared a national state of emergency. https://english.kyodonews.net/news/...oronavirus-outbreak-latest-april-17-2020.html Let's take a quick look at Brazil with their "take it like a man" approach: "Just chatted with my best friend in Brazil. The Brazilian president just fired the Minister of Health because he was pushing for social distancing, and quarantine. He just told me that the ICU beds in his city of 1 million are already full, and they are weeks behind the US on the curve. The population of Sao Paulo metro is 20 million people. Brazil has 2 mega cities with a lot of poor."