To a large degree, I agree politicians overreacted to the pandemic. If we knew then what we know now, we would not have shut down. While there are certainly some deaths in younger age brackets, most deaths occurred in those who were older or who had pre-existing conditions complicated by COVID-19. While all deaths from COVID-19 are regrettable, there is little evidence those at the highest risk could not have been protected as such. Instead, we shut down everything, for everyone, everywhere. However, I do believe the government failed to take appropriate action in the early stages of the pandemic. Early restrictions at preventing travel from China seem to have been effective at preventing the virus from entering the United States; most of the strain actually entered through Europe. The government should have restricted travel much earlier from all countries (as well as air travel); while this would have caused substantial disruption, it would have allowed for more to be known about the virus in the early stages. Furthermore, the government prevented the development of tools to fight coronavirus. The virus was in human studies by May, and was just as safe in August as it was in December, when the FDA put their temporary stamp of approval on it. Had the vaccine been distributed earlier, and had testing been available much earlier on, the spread of the virus could have been substantially reduced.
RE: Week 11 -- Question about how politicians reacted to the pandemic