The WSJ headlines today, on June 25th 2020: More Than 20 Million Americans May Have Had Coronavirus, Government Says
So, there are two numbers:
- 2.3 million people are officially counted as infected.
- 20 million says ‘the goverment’ might already have it
What we know is, that sadly 122,000 people died in the US from Covid-19 so far.
Herd immunity does not have the best reputation. For good reason. Since actual mitigation in the US is not doing so well right now, lets pick it as a working assumption here. Based on those two wildly different infection counts and assuming a 70% infection limit the US would end up with either:
- 12 million dead, if it were really only 2.3 million that are infected, or it would, like the Government choose to believe, be rather
- ‘only’ 1.3 million people who would succumb to that novel pathogen that keeps us on our toes this year.
What horrible bookends for this scenario! Both numbers are not cool. Neither for those who have to look at this fate personally, nor for their kin, nor for the country as a whole.
Sadly I don’t make this shit up. It is a grim possibility. One that is worth avoiding. Which can be done. Other countries are doing it. The US better start acting like it can as well. And soon. Any mitigation efforts take a while to take effect. During which the pool of infected people grows, and it gets exponentially harder to contain the outbreak.