Coronavirus: Sweden's death rate from COVID-19 surpasses USA

[Warpy]

26. Yet the rates aren't far apart, both over 200/1,000,000

which might be explained by the US's late response to the danger or the reluctance of dithering Republican governors to realize the gravity of the situation and call for restrictions.

NM issued strict restrictions long before Washington admitted there was a problem and our rate is more than double the average, 465 per million, largely due to a holocaust of it on the Navajo reservation and towns just outside it.

Restrictions are only a stopgap measure, at best, buying time to gear up production and distribution of necessary supplies to deal with a virus we can neither prevent nor treat. Producers did comply, but the administration has thrown a wrench into distribution by insisting on seizing supplies and micromanaging who gets them, and who gets them are generally not outside the government.

I don't know what the final numbers will look like in a couple of years, but I imagine the Swedish approach might not look all that much worse than Draconian restrictions followed by gradual opening.

I do know our numbers will be among the worst until we sweep out the heartless, gormless garbage in DC.