Need to take steps to limit future pandemic deaths

We have reached a grim milestone in U.S. history. One million people in the United States have now died as either a direct result of, or complications due to, the COVID-19 virus.

Disputes rage over almost every circumstance surrounding the virus and our (mis)management of it.

Even the number of deaths is hotly debated based on whether certain circumstances surrounding a death should be officially classified as COVID or not. Yet the fact remains that a million people lost their lives sooner than they likely would have if they had not been exposed to the deadly virus.

In popular culture, a loss on such a massive scale requires something otherworldly: an asteroid, an alien invasion, or an intergalactic villain coming to Earth and snapping his fingers, causing half the population of Clark County, Nev., to vanish as though they never existed.

Of course, those people didn’t just vanish, and they most certainly existed. Before they died, they were sick, suffering, struggling to breathe, and being cared for by relatives, loved ones, neighbors and an overburdened health care system.

Just three months into the pandemic, the world’s wealthiest hospitals, located inside the world’s wealthiest nation, were unable to gain access to enough masks, medicines, ventilators and protective gear. This caused patients to be sent home to fend for themselves, uncertain whether they would fully recover or find themselves returning, days later, to languish in the hallways and corridors of overcrowded hospitals.

The supply end failure had several causes but began with an almost entirely offshored system of manufacturing critical health care supplies that left the United States vulnerable to production stoppages beyond our borders. That challenge hasn’t gone away, and leaves the United States increasingly vulnerable to the regimes, whims and wars of other countries, most notably China and Indonesia, which have not exactly been friendly to the U.S.

Complicating the supply-chain issues was the failure of every level of pandemic backstop to adequately prepare or stockpile supplies. While it would be unreasonable to expect hospitals alone to stockpile fully for a multiyear pandemic like COVID, they are the first line of defense and should be expected to carry us through at least the first few months.

Similarly, the federal government, the consummate hero of pandemic film and literature, was also woefully unprepared. The large national stockpiles of medical supplies that many Americans envision being the last line of defense in a national emergency simply did not exist.

Instead of rushing to return to the way things were before — the gleeful ignorance of believing we were prepared for anything — we should instead be asking what we have learned. What needs to change? And how will we prepare better for the next national health emergency?

One million of our family, friends and neighbors have died in this pandemic. We owe it to their memory to take steps to limit future deaths.

— Las Vegas Sun