COVID19 Update - Day 193

US Tests: 91,243,810*

US Cases: 6,733,110*

US Deaths: 191,303*

Worldwide Cases: 30,666,122*

Worldwide Deaths: 954,905*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

Not all of the blame for the feckless U.S. response belongs to Trump.  He has certainly engaged in counterproductive behavior, like his hydroxychloroquine fetish, his refusal to wear a mask 99% of the time, and his repeated statements downplaying its severity.  And he has also enabled to really rotten behavior on the part of many Americans.

Unfortunately, I believe part of that rotten behavior is simply ingrained in the American psyche:

So why is testing declining in the US?

According to experts, there are three major factors: The summer’s worst Covid-19 outbreaks in the US have receded — reducing demand for tests. President Donald Trump’s administration recently recommended less testing, before backtracking on the changes this week. And state governments may not be reporting all the tests within their borders, particularly relatively newer antigen tests that are growing in use.

Combined, all these factors paint a grim picture for the US — one in which the country is still testing too little and flying blind, months into the coronavirus pandemic.

“Every time we make progress in terms of containing the pandemic, we take our foot off the brakes,” Thomas Tsai, a health policy expert at Harvard, told me. “What we really should be doing is to step on the brakes harder, and truly suppress the pandemic. As a country we seem content with half measures, so we end up in this situation where we never really suppress community transmission.”

Members of the 'Greatest Generation' scrimped on meat, butter, and sugar for SEVEN YEARS or more from the end of the Great Depression through the end of World War II.

I think all of them would be ashamed by how soft this country has become.