So we are allowed to talk politics? Sounds like it, as there are many political posts in this thread.

OK, I'll say first off that I'm glad it's not my job to be a top politician at any level trying to handle a pandemic and having to make the tough decisions that will affect everybody's life in one way or another (or end their lives in some cases). During my lifetime, what is happening now is unprecedented. So, how would you react faced with something like this and watching what was happening around the world and knowing that it was coming your way? Common sense would seem that you would be watching carefully, talking with the leaders of other countries that were going through it, coming up with a solid plan for the entire country to follow, and making sure that all equipment/supplies were in place and ready to be sent off to the states as needed, since nobody really knew where it would hit first or fastest. The first choices would have been those states with the busiest international airports, and the largest, most dense population centres. On the medical side of things, there could have been some action put in place to prepare hospitals around the country for what was coming, through education, access to the supply inventories that would have been currently being built up, etc.

I wouldn't want that job, but clearly I'm not qualified to do it. It would require somebody who would be able to understand the threat, and then activate all those people in their organization who have expertise in each field. A job like this takes many hands and many varied levels of expertise, and it takes somebody who is an excellent manager, who knows the strengths and weaknesses of their personnel and their departments, and doles out the tasks based on that knowledge. It would take somebody who recognized the severity of the threat and knew that they had to act quickly and effectively to (A) minimize the health effects on their people who look up to them for leadership, and (B) to understand that if they stopped it quickly and took appropriate steps, then they would minimize the damage to the economy.

So I'm not really in a position to judge, but IMHO, calling the disease a hoax, and suggesting treatments that have been proven by the scientific community to cause more harm than good wasn't helpful. Lots of time was wasted in that tomfoolery. But like I said, I wouldn't want the job. I'm not qualified.

Another point that perplexes me somewhat is how everything is just run like the wild west. Perhaps I just don't understand how the system works, but it seems like feds and states don't really have any connection other than the feds have the authority to pull the country together and force the states into some kind of action, but overall it just seems like the states are left on their own to do things however they want to - like there's no cohesiveness there whatsoever. Like the dad who lets all his kids run wild in the backyard, occasionally yelling at one or two of them if they do something they don't like. I really don't understand it, but I hate politics anyhow, so I've never bothered to get a deep understanding of it. From my experience in how corporations are run, however, a corporation that had no leadership or cohesiveness would likely go out of business unless they had such a strong market that they could be totally dysfunctional and still be in the black.

Just my 2¢. I really feel the pain of everybody out there who is being hit by this. I personally have been very lucky in that I can still work, and have been able to stay away from this damn virus. Stay healthy and safe everybody... there is light at the end of the tunnel.