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| Legend: US performance versus other wealthy nations: left, total deaths during pandemic; right, deaths during Omicron wave, source NYT |
COVID-19 has killed more than 6 million people on Earth. The figure, according to John Hopkins University, is staggering, but health officials admit it is a vast undercount. Deaths in the USA from the SARS-CoV2 virus already have surpassed 1 million, exceeding the death toll caused by the H1N1 virus in 1918-19. USA has failed to vaccinate as many people per capita as other developed nations; the daily death toll is now about 1500 persons. Peru has the dubious distinction of being the country with the most deaths per 100,000 people in the world. Now the world averages 7,000 deaths a da,y down from the daily peak of 14,000 in January 2021. Deaths are surging in New Zealand, Hong Kong and South Korea.
Incredibly, science has given mankind the ability to fight a rapidly evolving virus in real time, an unprecedented development in history. But because of wealth disparities, irrational fear of vaccines, and political opportunism the pandemic has been allowed to prolong itself.