12 Steps to Tackle the Coronavirus

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/11/opinion/coronavirus-united-states.html
"At least Emperor Nero supposedly only fiddled while Rome burned; he didn’t tell the Romans that the fire was no big deal. President Trump squandered two precious months trying to downplay the new coronavirus while attempting to talk up the stock market. We still have no idea how many Americans are infected, because the administration bungled diagnostics. As of a few days ago, South Korea had conducted up to 700 times more tests per capita than the United States. Trump’s passivity will cost lives, but we can still make preparations before hospitals risk becoming overwhelmed by a pandemic that is both more contagious than the seasonal flu and apparently many times more lethal. Dr. Tom Frieden, a former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, warns that in a plausible worst-case scenario, this virus could kill more than one million Americans. After speaking to epidemiologists and public health specialists, I have a list of a dozen practical steps that the president and other officials should take immediately, while there is time. 1. Invest in a huge rollout of free testing so that we know who is sick. The University of Washington set up a drive-through system so that certain people can be tested without contaminating a clinic; South Korea did the same. We urgently need “rapid tests” — offering results in minutes — and before long we will also desperately need tests to determine who has had the virus and now has immunity. 2. Cancel large gatherings in parts of the country where community transmission is occurring, as Gov. Jay Inslee has done in Washington State. Employers should encourage people to work from home where possible. Even with social distancing, more than one-third of Americans may eventually be infected (a worst case is that 70 percent become infected, as Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany has cautioned for her country). But lives will be saved by flattening the curve so that infections grow more slowly."