“If the US had Canada’s Covid-19 death rate,” a Vox headline declares, “225,000 more Americans would likely be alive today.” The body of the article (no pun intended) reads:
While there are nations with higher death rates, this still puts the US in the top 20 percent for deaths among the world’s developed countries, with more than twice the death rate of the median developed country.
Some numbers to put that in perspective:
- If the US had the same death rate as the European Union overall, nearly 79,000 Americans who died of Covid-19 would likely still be alive (unless they died of other causes).
- If the US had the same death rate as Germany, more than 212,000 Americans who died of Covid-19 would likely still be alive.
- If the US had the same death rate as Canada, nearly 225,000 Americans who died of Covid-19 would likely still be alive.
- If the US had the same death rate as Australia, nearly 361,000 Americans who died of Covid-19 would likely still be alive. Fewer than 12,000 would have died, compared to the 365,000 who died in reality.
- If the US had the same death rate as Japan, nearly 363,000 Americans who died of Covid-19 would likely still be alive — and fewer than 10,000 Americans would have died of the disease.
In Los Angeles, aurhorities expect to have Dodger Stadium set up by the end of this week as a mass vaccination site capable ultimately of delivering 12,000 doses per day (CNN).
With little national coordination from the Trump White House, vaccine roll-out continues to pose problems (USA Today):
Anger and frustration are surging across the country as the federal government leaves states to handle the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines. Through Friday, states had received 22.1 million doses of the vaccines. Of those, about 6.7 million – less than one-third – had been administered.
Poor messaging and inconsistent procedures are forcing people to scramble on their own to find vaccines.
Can it get worse? Yes it can:
The much-criticized rollout by the Trump administration has laid the groundwork for a scenario in which the rich and the politically connected use their money and power to cut in line and get vaccinated before everyone else, they said.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has already threatened to impose fines of up to $1 million and revoke the licenses of doctors, nurses and others who don’t follow state and federal vaccine distribution guidelines, which currently place a priority on inoculating front-line health care workers and nursing home residents.
There have been reports in Miami of big hospital donors getting the first crack at the vaccine and in New York of tycoons flying their friends down to Florida to get inoculated with doses earmarked for a retirement home.
And in Colorado, some teachers are crying foul after nurses and educators in wealthier public school districts and private schools got inoculated first.
Bio-ethicist Arthur Caplan of New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine said in an interview last month, “Anything that’s seen as life-saving, life-preserving and that’s in short supply creates black markets.”
Great. They say bad things come in threes. So, global pandemic, insurrection/civil war, and what? Alien invasion?