3 ms·
> Yet the USA death toll is over 130,000 people - that is a terrible thing =(. I do not get how the USA can be so blase about it. Because on a per capita basis
by xienze 6y ago
> Yet the USA death toll is over 130,000 people - that is a terrible thing =(. I do not get how the USA can be so blase about it.
Because on a per capita basis the US actually has fewer deaths per million than multiple European countries? Ask yourself how e.g. Belgians can be so blasé about this, they’re doing worse than us in this regard!
Or maybe it’s because deaths have dropped dramatically from their peak and continue to do so?
Or maybe it’s because tens of thousands of people die every year of the flu in each and every western country and to the US, 130K Covid deaths is like 3 or 4 years worth of flu deaths, which no one really cares about?
This is not the Black Death. People don’t care about it because it’s still exceedingly rare to die of it, that’s basically all there is to it.
- monocasa 6y ago> 130K Covid deaths is like 3 or 4 years worth of flu deaths, which no one really cares about? That's one way to put it. Another is it's already more American deaths than total in WWI in just a handful of months and we're not over the biggest hump yet.
- nmfisher 6y agoTrue, but 'number of deaths' is a very blunt statistic because not all deaths are equal. The death of a young male in his prime is not the same as the death of an elderly person whose 3 year survival rate was already less than 25% (made-up numbers for the sake of illustration, not accurate).
- maerF0x0 6y agoIt's worth noting in your comparison that the US Population was less than 1/3 it is now, and most were young productive men just beginning their lives. Covid is more than elderly people who have had long lives (relative to historical numbers). So relatively speaking WW1 was much more devastating.