On Tuesday, 1,888 Americans died of COVID-19, pushing the 18-month death toll past 664,000.
The raw number is horrifying – roughly equal to the populations of Las Vegas, Detroit, or Oklahoma City. So too is the proportion of Americans who have succumbed to the virus: 1 in 500.
Amid an excruciating national conversation focused on vaccine mandates and masking rules, the grim statistical milestone is a reminder that the pandemic isn’t primarily a political event or mere fodder for partisan media. Rather, it’s a public health catastrophe that has taken loved ones from hundreds of thousands of families.
More deaths and more grief are coming. Within a few days, COVID-19 will have killed more Americans than the 1918-19 flu.
Once we surpass that number – 675,000 dead – COVID-19 will be responsible for a body count equivalent to two hundred and twenty six 9/11s.
The nation’s elderly have been particularly hard-hit: 1 in 35 Americans 85 years or older have died of the virus. But as the highly transmissible delta variant has become the dominant COVID-19 strain in America, more young people are getting sick than ever before. Pediatric cases have increased 240% since early July. In mid-August 2020, about 9% of all COVID-19 fatalities were 54 years old or younger; a year later, that number was over 20%.
At the outset of the pandemic, the public health community was focused on “flattening the curve.” That is – keeping case numbers manageable through interventions like mask wearing and social distancing until a vaccine was developed and deployed.
The vaccines are here, but the curve is not flat. Hospitals across the country – particularly in the South – are near capacity. One in four hospitals report that their ICU’s are 95% filled — up from one in five last month.
This is all to say, the pandemic is still an open wound in America. It will continue to bleed as long as we ignore the staggering human loss it has caused.