[Goose]

Nothing like this has happened in the US in 100 years.

Recognize these?



The first of those was 1952 and 1946 & polio. (The 58K cases is equivalent to 116K cases today.)  1853 and 1855 were yellow fever epidemics.

M T there is one of gigantic proportions difference between the current COVID-19 epidemic and all the examples you cite. While the epidemics you cite were certainly serious, they all involved disease that was known and had previously been encountered. The local health departments knew what to expect, and so did the population at large. There was no argument that yellow fever was "no big deal". People knew it was, because they had suffered from it before. The health professionals also knew what to do. Ditto Polio. In many cases they couldn't do much, but they at least knew it and they knew it wasn't going to spread like wildfire.

No comparison whatsoever with COVID-19 which we have never seen before and still understand very little about. You DO have to go back to 1918 to find a novel agent that had no history (and no immunity) in the general populace and no "playbook" in the public health system. That makes a big difference when trying to decide what is an appropriate response.

[Goose]

Nothing like this has happened in the US in 100 years.

Recognize these?



The first of those was 1952 and 1946 & polio. (The 58K cases is equivalent to 116K cases today.)  1853 and 1855 were yellow fever epidemics.

M T there is one of gigantic proportions difference between the current COVID-19 epidemic and all the examples you cite. While the epidemics you cite were certainly serious, they all involved disease that was known and had previously been encountered. The local health departments knew what to expect, and so did the population at large. There was no argument that yellow fever was "no big deal". People knew it was, because they had suffered from it before. The health professionals also knew what to do. Ditto Polio. In many cases they couldn't do much, but they at least knew it and they knew it wasn't going to spread like wildfire.

No comparison whatsoever with COVID-19 which we have never seen before and still understand very little about. You DO have to go back to 1918 to find a novel agent that had no history (and no immunity) in the general populace and no "playbook" in the public health system. That makes a big difference when trying to decide what is an appropriate response.