Philip Cheung / The New York Times / Redux
The coronavirus pandemic may be in its final stage in the U.S. But it will not be the last pandemic of the 21st century.
Since the turn of the century, SARS-CoV-2 is already the second virus to create a pandemic (the first was the H1N1 influenza in 2009) and the third coronavirus outbreak, following the first SARS crisis in 2003 and the emergence of Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome, also known as MERS, in 2012.
If the U.S. can expect roughly one global plague every 10 years, it will have to do better than it did over the past 12 months, when it shut down much of the economy to save lives but lost more than 500,000 souls anyway. In the past few weeks, I asked several scientists, epidemiologists, and other experts to tell me what they considered the foundational failure, or “original sin,” of our COVID-19 response. Was it the hemming and hawing over masks? The overly constrictive lockdowns in places that didn’t yet require them, followed by a reluctance to re-impose them when they became necessary? The delusional denials from the Trump administration? All received a mention. But to my surprise, one thing stood out above everything else: tests.