A Tragic Reality in Human Fallibility

"If you would have talked to me in 2019, I would have said I'd be surprised. But if you talked to me in probably April or May 2020, I would say I would not be surprised we'd hit this point."

"A lot of the mistakes that we definitely fell into in 1918, we hoped we wouldn't fall into in 2020. We did."

"The internet can be a double-edged sword. It provides us with the opportunity to receive the CDC and the World Health Organization [updates] and to share information much more quickly. But that also means we can spread misinformation quickly as well."

"We have absolutely seen -- especially with long COVID -- that young people are far from invincible.

[No matter how good the science and public health advice are], those things are only as good as the behavioral response."

"We'll get new variants [including some that might cause reinfection. But eventually], I do think those variants will be closely enough related, probably, to the things we've already been vaccinated against or  the things we've already been exposed to that it won't cause the same sort of severe disease."

"Essentially, what the vaccine does is it gives you your first and second exposure for free -- without the dangers of Covid-19."

"That's extremely helpful, and that goes a long way to reducing mortality."

Stephen Kissler, epidemiologist, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

The "In America: Remember" public art installation in Washington, DC, commemorates all Americans who have died from Covid-19. On September 18, more than 660,000 small plastic flags were at the site, some with personal messages to those who died.  CNN

The United States -- arguably the most technologically advanced and the most powerful and wealthy country in the world -- has become the country whose experience in protecting its population and controlling the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus causing COVID-19 stands out as the most miserable of performances with few exceptions. Italy and Spain in Europe come to mind when thinking of COVID-control failures. But the United States stands out as the ultimate failure, given its advantages.

In the United States the COVID-19 pandemic has now surpassed the death toll of the 1918 influenza pandemic, a situation that most American experts feel was completely avoidable, once the miracle of effective and safe vaccines emerged. Now, from day one of the emergence of COVID-19 in the U.S. to the present, a total death count of 675,445 has been revealed in the account of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. A century ago the influenza pandemic killed 675,000 Americans.

 

The Oakland Municipal Auditorium in California was converted to a temporary hospital with volunteer nurses from the American Red Cross in 1918.

During the time of the great and deadly influenza epidemic there were no vaccines, and nor were there respirators. In this modern era of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic there are approved, efficacious and safe vaccines developed in a surprisingly short interval between the arrival of COVID and the first wave that shook the world. Medical science rose to the occasion enabling vast populations to be inoculated against the virus and promising to stop COVID in its tracks. It has done just that in some areas of the world, while many others are still struggling to achieve control.

In the United States, out of its total population of about 350 million people, 70 million Americans eligible to receive the vaccine doses and urged by the medical community and government agencies to do so, have refused. They are the vulnerable wedge that defeats the country's efforts to achieve a level of control over the virus. These are not vaccine-hesitant people who wait for more definitive data and assurances that those who have been vaccinated suffer no great harm -- but the hard-core anti-vaccination corps in society.

"To have so many people who have died with modern medicine is distressing. The number we are at represents a number that is far worse than it should be in the U.S.", stated Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Translational Research Institute. This, at a time when the original virus's onslaught has succumbed to the Delta variant, a far more contagious mutant. The initial wave struck the country a hard blow until it leveled off, leaving the hope that the solution had been found, with vaccine availability.

Now, with the Delta variant representing the new face of COVID's destructive power the U.S. sees itself in a danerous new phase, fading the hope that control was close. There are some differences from the 1918 plague; there was a much smaller population in the U.S. at the tme The Influenza pandemic struck  young people, unlike COVID which to the present has been less of a threat to the young than it is to those 65 and older. The 1918 pandemic cut a swath of death in a 14-to15-week period. COVID-19 has lasted an interminable 18 months and is ongoing.

And then there is this to consider about numbers; the excess death total estimated out of the U.S.Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has the total number at 830,443 fatalities, leaving the possibility that the numbers cited could represent an undercount, a situation common to many countries as they struggle to decipher the damage wrought to population health. In the U.S. it was December of 2020 when the vaccinations became available for immediate use. Since that time, the great majority of  deaths have occurred among the unvaccinated.

"Vaccines are a paramount part of the strategy, but we have failed on other measures as well.

We're fighting this war with two hands behind our back", observed Eric Topol the Scripps director.

 

A nurse tends to a Covid patient at a hospital in Oklahoma City. Some hospitals in the worst-affected US states are rationing care due to the latest wave of the virus  Nick Oxford/Reuters

"Controlling the pandemic depends on two factors: the leadership provided by government and public behaviour." 

"On both fronts the U.S. has done poorly compared to other countries."

Dr. Ali Mokdad, professor of global health, University of Washington

"It is so frustrating that we are facing another Covid surge in hospitals, which could have been prevented." 

"About 99 per cent of COVID patients we see in ICU are unvaccinated . . . That is the impact of misinformation."

Matthew Crecelius, intensive care unit nurse, Michigan