That's not the same as "no strategy", because this level of decentralization is how nation-states work today.
It's also, incidentally, how the EU works. There are open borders between member states — and while some member states "closed" their borders, this has been largely unenforceable in land crossings because there are no border patrol agents between every single land crossing between EU member states. Border enforcements have only been enforced at airports.
In the US, nationwide air travel came to a near complete stand-still during the outset of the pandemic, so inter-state travel was already at the same levels you had in the EU.
The US's strategy has been the same as the EU's, and it has been to let the member States define the strategy.
As of right now, 36 out of 50 US states have a lower per capita death rate[1] than France, Sweden, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, and Ireland[2]. 15 States have a lower per capita death rate than Germany and Denmark, who have seen the best COVID outcomes in the EU.
The US, to date, has administered more tests per capita than Belgium, Australia, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Norway, and Sweden (to name a handful). This is not because the US has a nationwide testing regime, rather it's because testing systems have been administered at the State level, with varying strategies (some focusing on nursing homes, some focusing on drive-thru testing etc).
> That's not the same as "no strategy", because this level of decentralization is how nation-states work today.
It's one thing to leave pandemic response to member countries like the EU does. Each country knows it's responsible for its own response. Money is budgeted and spent specifically for this purpose.
That's not the system in the US - or hasn't been. The Federal government maintains what, until recently, was the world's premier infectious disease-fighting organization - the CDC. The implication was that pandemic response occurs through this organization. In the past, this is exactly what happened.
You may recall the one state (Washington) earlier this year whose brave scientists decided to test for COVID on their own. They were told in no uncertain terms from the feds to stand down or else.
So the idea that this pandemic response is up to the states doesn't hold water. Had the states known that they'd be left twisting in the wind, they could have taken steps beforehand.
That's one likely outcome of this event (assuming it has a clean endpoint): states realizing they really are on their own - and acting like it.
> That's not the system in the US - or hasn't been. The Federal government maintains what, until recently, was the world's premier infectious disease-fighting organization - the CDC. The implication was that pandemic response occurs through this organization. In the past, this is exactly what happened.
While you're right that the Federal government has the CDC, every single US States has its own infectious disease/health agency[1]. Furthermore, the EU also has its own centralized disease agency[2]. Structurally, both the US and EU are very similar in this regard. The only key difference is that (to your point) the EU States may override the ECDC, whereas US States may not — certainly a worthwhile policy change for the US.
> So the idea that this pandemic response is up to the states doesn't hold water. Had the states known that they'd be left twisting in the wind, they could have taken steps beforehand.
But this is factually incorrect, States did take steps beforehand. By March 23, every single State declared a state of emergency, and 48/50 States closed their schools. By as early as March 9th, the States were doing the VAST majority of COVID testing[3]. As of right now, the US has administered more tests per capita than Belgium, Australia, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Norway, and Sweden (to name a handful). This is not because the US has a nationwide testing regime, rather it is because testing systems have been administered at the State level[4].
> While you're right that the Federal government has the CDC, every single US States has its own infectious disease/health agency[1].
Those appear to be general public heath agencies with names like: "Department of Health Services"; "Medicaid"; and "Department of Health and Environment". I don't see one mention of the word "infectious" to indicate specialty.
None appear to be a unit with a mandate along the lines of "Detecting and responding to new and emerging health threats"
> By March 23, every single State declared a state of emergency, and 48/50 States closed their schools.
I was alluding to steps that might have been taken many years ago. Like, for example, establishing rapid response teams. Like, for example, giving states carte blanche to do their own testing when needed and not be forced to wait around for the CDC to do something. Certainly not reprimanded for taking the initiative.
> Those appear to be general public heath agencies with names like: "Department of Health Services"; "Medicaid"; and "Department of Health and Environment". I don't see one mention of the word "infectious" to indicate specialty.
Lmao what, that’s your argument? That’s just what the states call it. Take, for example, the Minnesota Department of Health. Among other things, its main charter is “disease control and prevention”[1]. This is true across the board. Every single US State has such an agency, whose staff are currently working full time on COVID. “I don’t see one word of the word infections”. Come on, really? THAT’S the best you got?
> "ECDC has approximately 300 staff and commands an annual budget of over €50 million."
What’s your point? The EU has funded their centralized agency less than the US, so? That doesn’t change the fact that the US has a federalized structure similar to the EU, where the States have a similar level of autonomy as their counterparts in the EU. The US State health agencies fall under the purviews of the State governments, which are wholly independent from the Federal government.
> "CDC's budget for fiscal year 2018 is $11.9 billion.”
Take this and also compare the budgets to the state government health agencies. The New York CITY Department of Health, whose responsibility includes infectious disease prevention has a budget of $1.6 billion, with 6,000 employees[2]. That’s just for the CITY of New York!
Random anecdote about the difference: I (in Germany) can't really remember seeing anything about what ECDC said or thinks in the past months in the media, only about country-level (and lower) authorities. Whereas US-CDC seems quoted quite a lot in US media.
Oh for sure, the CDC is certainly more talked about by the media, but the power and structure of the agencies is fairly similar.
It's only a matter of time until EU's agencies impose supremacy on its Member States. The EU supreme court is already starting to penalize member States for violating policies[1].
ECDC has primarily the "power" to coordinate data exchange between member states, and afaik no authority to force lower-level health authorities or healthcare providers to do anything, unless member states were to explicitly adopt their suggestions as binding in local law.
The mess that's going on with ECB is an IMHO quite special situation (which also is an odd example for "already starting to penalize for violating policies". There is no "starting to", obviously EU law has enforcement tools - although the court itself can't use them)
In the EU, land crossings were re-manned on many borders and during the main lockdown (which is now mostly over) passenger travel on many land borders was stopped. On many borders (though not all) physical border checkpoints still exist even if they're widely open almost always, and the legal and administrative framework for controlling land borders is still maintained. Of course, it is now much easier to cross the border illegally outside of these checkpoints than before, but this still allows effective control of travel as most people are not criminals.
"Border enforcements have only been enforced at airports." is absolutely not true. For example, I recall the international issue of making transit arrangements through Poland when back in March many people were stranded as the Poland-German border was suddenly closed; if I recall correctly, the agreed solution to repatriate these people was a police-escorted car column that was allowed to transit through Poland without these people being allowed "proper entry", but before that they were stuck for days in their cars as they could not get through the border.
This is a key difference between EU and USA - the Schengen agreement allows member states to temporarily "opt out" of the free travel, reinstate border controls and impose travel restrictions (up to a full closure of borders) for various purposes, and many EU countries did just that due to Covid; while in USA, as far as I understand, the constitution greatly limits the right of states to prohibit interstate travel.
> This is a key difference between EU and USA - the Schengen agreement allows member states to temporarily "opt out" of the free travel, reinstate border controls and impose travel restrictions (up to a full closure of borders) for various purposes, and many EU countries did just that due to Covid; while in USA, as far as I understand, the constitution greatly limits the right of states to prohibit interstate travel.
The Supreme Court has directly addressed this in the case of disease epidemics and found that, in the absence of specific Congressional action preempting such regulations, states are free under the Constitution to respond to epidemic disease (and several other kinds of crisis) by enacting and enforcing travel restrictions, even though they impact interstate commerce.
While no state has adopted border closures for containing COVID-19, several have adopted quarantine policies affecting interstate travel and adopted border checkpoints as part of the enforcement mechanism.
> while in USA, as far as I understand, the constitution greatly limits the right of states to prohibit interstate travel.
The US States have been imposing varying levels of requirements on inter-state travel from other states. New York requires anyone entering from a set of states to quarantine for 14 days[1]. Maine requires visitors from a list of States to have been tested (I'm traveling to Maine and will be getting tested ahead of my trip)[2]. These are just a couple handy examples, but it's true across the board.
And finally this is all moot because, per my original post, the results really speak for themselves: the majority of US States have lower per capita death rates than the major EU member states, and a small handful have lower per capita death rate than the best EU member states (Germany, Denmark).
> New York requires anyone entering from a set of states to quarantine for 14 days[1].
Does it actually enforce this, or is it just an advisory? Has anyone been fined or arrested for breaking quarantine? Are they conducting papers-and-purpose-of-stay-please inspections at the interestates, prior to entering the state?
The only state that I know of that actually enforced quarantine is Hawaii, and even there, the beaches have magically filled with tourists over the past week... I'm sure all of them sat inside their hotel rooms for the entire two-week quarantine period...
> lower per capita death rate than the best EU member states (Germany, Denmark).
You repeat that a couple of times in your posts, I am curious where do you get that from? Germany and Denmark are not "the best", they are both above the median in the EU.
The main point is that any criticism you might level against the US States for its supposed "lack of strategy", ought to just as easily be leveled against Germany. Instead, Germany is widely regarded as having a coordinated/successful strategy[1][2].
Even among the EU States with the fewest deaths / M — that is Hungary, Finland, Slovenia, Estonia, Poland, Croatia, Latvia, etc — you have comparable US States in Maine, Utah, Idaho, West Virginia, Oregon, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, and Hawaii.
> In the EU, land crossings were re-manned on many borders and during the main lockdown (which is now mostly over) passenger travel on many land borders was stopped.
Which was one of most nonsensical measure and it is real shame that EC did not prevented that. It caused real problems for people living near borders and working in neighboring state, and for cargo transit.
Covid-19 prevalence was not homogenous inside each country and inter-country neighboring areas/districts were often more similar than far-away intra-country areas. Therefore, any movement restriction would make more sense on more fine-grained level, but doing it on country level is just political tool to mobilize nationalistic support.
> Border enforcements have only been enforced at airports.
That's wrong. Most land borders, also within the Schengen area were closed and only a small amount of people, i.e. citizens, workers were permitted to cross.
Things are slowly opening now within the EU. But that you could just waltz over any old land border is flat out wrong.
It's also, incidentally, how the EU works. There are open borders between member states — and while some member states "closed" their borders, this has been largely unenforceable in land crossings because there are no border patrol agents between every single land crossing between EU member states. Border enforcements have only been enforced at airports.
In the US, nationwide air travel came to a near complete stand-still during the outset of the pandemic, so inter-state travel was already at the same levels you had in the EU.
The US's strategy has been the same as the EU's, and it has been to let the member States define the strategy.
As of right now, 36 out of 50 US states have a lower per capita death rate[1] than France, Sweden, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, and Ireland[2]. 15 States have a lower per capita death rate than Germany and Denmark, who have seen the best COVID outcomes in the EU.
The US, to date, has administered more tests per capita than Belgium, Australia, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Norway, and Sweden (to name a handful). This is not because the US has a nationwide testing regime, rather it's because testing systems have been administered at the State level, with varying strategies (some focusing on nursing homes, some focusing on drive-thru testing etc).
[1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/
[2] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries