94% of countries have lower Covid-19 death rates than US

[SunSeeker]

With news today that the US now has the most total Covid-19 deaths of any country in the world, the right wing is deflecting by claiming that is not the proper "statistical analysis" to apply. I have been hearing a lot of right wing talking points that we are "way down the list when it comes to death rate," so we should "move on" from "obsessing" over the total deaths and that we should "look at the death rates per capita." Some even claim the US has "done a damn good job" when compared to other countries, that we are doing a better job than "more than half of Europe." When you hear that, please call these people out as liars. If we don't use the "L" word, then we are just letting them gaslight us.

First, there are 195 countries in the world, and only 11 have worse Covid-19 death rates per capita (deaths/1 million population) than the US. That puts us in the top worst 6% in the world. In other words, we are doing a poorer job than 94% of the countries in the world, by the right wing's own criteria.

And if you want to just talk about Europe, it doesn't get much better. There are 44 countries in Europe. Only 10 European countries have a Covid-19 per capita death rate worse than us. So, in other words, 77% of European countries are doing a "better job" than us.

Here are the 149 countries who have Covid-19 cases, and their death rates (from https://www.realclearpolitics.com/coronavirus/ ):

Total Global Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths: 108,828 Total Global Confirmed Cases: 1,780,315

Country- Deaths-Deaths/1M-ND-Tests- Confirmed Cases- CC Ftl Rate-CC/1M-EstCases:

1Spain 16,606 355.4 - 355,000 163,027 10.19% 3,489.2 -
2Italy 19,468 322.2 - 963,473 152,271 12.79% 2,519.7 -
3Belgium 3,346 292.9 - 102,151 28,018 11.94% 2,453.0 -
4Saint Maarten 9 213.9 - 134 50 18.00% 1,188.1 -
5France 13,832 206.5 - 333,807 129,654 10.67% 1,935.5 -
6Netherlands 2,643 153.4 - 101,534 24,413 10.83% 1,416.8 -
7United Kingdom 9,875 148.5 - 334,974 78,991 12.50% 1,188.0 -
8Switzerland 1,036 121.6 - 190,000 25,107 4.13% 2,948.0 -
9Luxembourg 62 102.0 - 28,965 3,270 1.90% 5,380.7 -
10Sweden 887 87.1 - 54,700 10,151 8.74% 996.8 -
11Ireland 320 65.9 - 53,000 8,928 3.58% 1,839.5 -
12United States 20,577 62.9 - 2,670,674 532,879 3.86% 1,628.8 -
13Bermuda 4 62.5 - 416 50 8.00% 780.9 -
14Iran 4,357 53.3 - 251,703 70,029 6.22% 856.1 -
15Portugal 470 45.7 - 162,798 15,987 2.94% 1,554.9 -
16Denmark 260 44.8 - 67,771 5,996 4.34% 1,034.2 -
17Austria 337 38.1 - 140,975 13,806 2.44% 1,560.5 -
18Germany 2,871 34.6 - 1,317,887 125,452 2.29% 1,512.8 -
19Turks and Caicos 1 28.2 - 62 9 11.11% 253.9 -
20Liechtenstein 1 26.4 - 900 79 1.27% 2,083.9 -
21Slovenia 50 24.2 - 34,279 1,188 4.21% 574.6 -
22Isle of Man 2 24.0 - 1,934 226 0.88% 2,712.6 -
23Norway 119 22.4 - 124,279 6,409 1.86% 1,206.0 -
24Antigua and Barbuda 2 20.8 - 40 21 9.52% 218.1 -
25Bahamas 8 20.3 - - 46 17.39% 116.9 -
26Panama 79 18.9 - 14,588 3,234 2.44% 774.3 -
27Ecuador 315 18.4 - 21,568 7,257 4.34% 424.8 -
28Estonia 24 18.2 - 29,456 1,304 1.84% 987.2 -
29Canada 653 17.6 - 401,552 23,318 2.80% 629.2 -
30North Macedonia 34 16.3 - 7,653 760 4.47% 364.9 -
31Martinique 6 15.9 - - 155 3.87% 411.7 -
32Romania 291 14.9 - 59,272 5,990 4.86% 307.6 -
33Barbados 4 13.9 - 747 68 5.88% 236.9 -
34Turkey 1,101 13.4 - 340,380 52,167 2.11% 633.7 -
35Dominican Republic 135 12.7 - 8,469 2,759 4.89% 259.6 -
36Czechia 129 12.1 - 120,285 5,902 2.19% 555.4 -
37Israel 101 11.4 - 117,339 10,743 0.94% 1,209.3 -
38Bosnia and Herzegovina 37 11.1 - 6,911 946 3.91% 284.6 -
39Serbia 74 10.6 - 16,399 3,380 2.19% 484.1 -
40Finland 49 8.9 - 44,354 2,905 1.69% 526.5 -
41Hungary 85 8.7 - 31,961 1,310 6.49% 134.1 -
42Greece 93 8.7 - 37,344 2,081 4.47% 194.0 -
43Moldova 30 8.5 - 6,271 1,560 1.92% 439.9 -
44Cyprus 10 8.4 - 17,119 616 1.62% 518.0 -
45Lithuania 23 8.2 - 38,472 1,026 2.24% 367.8 -
46Albania 23 8.0 - 3,644 433 5.31% 151.1 -
47Guyana 6 7.7 - 193 45 13.33% 57.5 -
48Mauritius 9 7.1 - 6,730 319 2.82% 252.0 -
49Algeria 275 6.5 - 3,359 1,825 15.07% 43.2 -
50Malta 3 6.2 - 16,016 370 0.81% 765.2 -
51Trinidad and Tobago 8 5.9 - 1,102 112 7.14% 82.1 -
52Peru 181 5.7 - 67,712 6,848 2.64% 214.1 -
53Poland 208 5.5 - 129,560 6,356 3.27% 167.4 -
54Brazil 1,140 5.4 - 62,985 20,962 5.44% 100.1 -
55Croatia 21 5.1 - 15,691 1,534 1.37% 375.1 -
56Belize 2 4.9 - 364 13 15.38% 31.8 -
57Armenia 13 4.4 - 6,484 967 1.34% 327.6 -
58South Korea 214 4.1 +3 514,621 10,512 2.04% 203.0 -
59Bulgaria 28 4.0 - 18,502 661 4.24% 94.1 -
60Chile 73 3.9 - 76,374 6,927 1.05% 369.9 -
61Bahrain 6 3.8 - 60,425 1,040 0.58% 662.7 -
62Montenegro 2 3.2 - 2,869 263 0.76% 422.6 -
63Morocco 111 3.1 - 7,734 1,545 7.18% 42.9 -
64Lebanon 20 2.9 - 14,055 619 3.23% 90.4 -
65Honduras 25 2.6 +1 1,600 393 6.36% 41.0 -
66Belarus 23 2.4 - 53,000 2,226 1.03% 234.7 -
67Tunisia 28 2.4 - 10,676 685 4.09% 59.2 -
68China* 3,339 2.4 - - 82,052 4.07% 58.9 -
69Brunei 1 2.3 - 9,637 136 0.74% 317.0 -
70Philippines 247 2.3 - 24,500 4,428 5.58% 41.5 -
71Malaysia 73 2.3 - 71,897 4,530 1.61% 143.7 -
72Australia 57 2.3 +1 351,380 6,303 0.90% 252.2 -
73Mexico 273 2.2 +40 35,479 4,219 6.47% 33.4 -
74Qatar 6 2.2 - 47,751 2,728 0.22% 980.7 -
75Bolivia 24 2.1 +4 2,185 300 8.00% 26.4 -
76UAE 20 2.1 - 648,195 3,736 0.54% 387.9 -
77Colombia 100 2.0 - 40,603 2,709 3.69% 54.6 -
78Argentina 89 2.0 - 18,027 2,142 4.15% 48.1 -
79Uruguay 7 2.0 - 7,496 494 1.42% 140.4 -
80DRC 20 1.9 - - 223 8.97% 21.0 -
81Iraq 72 1.9 - 33,889 1,318 5.46% 34.3 -
82Djibouti 2 1.9 - 4,017 187 1.07% 173.4 -
83Suriname 1 1.7 - - 10 10.00% 17.2 -
84Iceland 8 1.6 - 34,635 1,689 0.47% 348.0 -
85Ukraine 73 1.6 - 26,577 2,511 2.91% 56.3 -
86Latvia 3 1.6 - 27,796 630 0.48% 327.0 -
87Saudi Arabia 52 1.5 - 115,585 4,033 1.29% 119.7 -
88Egypt 146 1.5 - 25,000 1,939 7.53% 19.7 -
89Cuba 16 1.4 - 13,162 620 2.58% 55.3 -
90Singapore 8 1.4 - 72,680 2,299 0.35% 407.7 -
91Burkina Faso 27 1.4 - - 484 5.58% 24.5 -
92Jamaica 4 1.4 - 907 69 5.80% 23.5 -
93Indonesia 327 1.2 - 19,452 3,842 8.51% 14.4 -
94Liberia 5 1.1 - - 48 10.42% 10.7 -
95Azerbaijan 11 1.1 - 61,342 1,058 1.04% 106.4 -
96El Salvador 6 0.9 - - 118 5.08% 18.2 -
97Paraguay 6 0.9 - 2,262 134 4.48% 19.3 -
98Japan 108 0.9 - 68,771 6,748 1.60% 53.3 -
99New Zealand 4 0.8 - 61,167 1,330 0.30% 272.2 -
100Georgia 3 0.8 - 3,271 242 1.24% 64.9 -
101Kyrgyzstan 5 0.8 - 9,618 339 1.47% 52.0 -
102Russia 106 0.7 - 1,184,442 13,584 0.78% 94.0 -
103Jordan 7 0.7 - 20,500 381 1.84% 38.3 -
104Oman 3 0.6 - - 546 0.55% 113.1 -
105Costa Rica 3 0.6 - 6,608 577 0.52% 115.4 -
106Hong Kong 4 0.5 - 96,709 1,001 0.40% 134.3 -
107Kazakhstan 10 0.5 - 61,955 865 1.16% 46.3 -
108Thailand 35 0.5 - 71,860 2,518 1.39% 36.3 -
109Niger 11 0.5 - 4,298 491 2.24% 22.0 -
110Afghanistan 18 0.5 - - 555 3.24% 14.9 -
111Cameroon 12 0.5 - - 820 1.46% 32.5 -
112Gabon 1 0.5 - - 46 2.17% 21.2 -
113South Africa 25 0.4 - 75,053 2,028 1.23% 35.1 -
114Botswana 1 0.4 - 2,527 13 7.69% 5.6 -
115Gambia 1 0.4 - 281 9 11.11% 3.8 -
116Pakistan 86 0.4 - 57,836 5,011 1.72% 23.6 -
117Palestine 2 0.4 - 16,992 268 0.75% 53.0 -
118Togo 3 0.4 - 2,069 76 3.95% 9.6 -
119Slovakia 2 0.4 - 25,846 728 0.27% 133.7 -
120Mali 7 0.4 - - 87 8.05% 4.4 -
121Sri Lanka 7 0.3 - 4,525 199 3.52% 9.2 -
122Venezuela 9 0.3 - 181,335 175 5.14% 5.4 -
123Ghana 8 0.3 - 37,405 408 1.96% 13.5 -
124Taiwan 6 0.3 - 45,436 385 1.56% 16.2 -
125Mauritania 1 0.2 - 380 7 14.29% 1.7 -
126Kuwait 1 0.2 - - 1,154 0.09% 278.9 -
127India 288 0.2 - 189,111 8,446 3.41% 6.2 -
128Zimbabwe 3 0.2 - 547 14 21.43% 0.9 -
129Bangladesh 30 0.2 - 8,313 482 6.22% 3.0 -
130Guatemala 3 0.2 - 1,134 153 1.96% 9.2 -
131Haiti 2 0.2 - 365 33 6.06% 2.9 -
132Ivory Coast 4 0.2 - - 533 0.75% 21.3 -
133Nicaragua 1 0.2 - - 9 11.11% 1.4 -
134Kenya 7 0.1 - 6,192 191 3.66% 4.0 -
135Libya 1 0.1 - 507 25 4.00% 3.6 -
136Senegal 2 0.1 - - 278 0.72% 17.5 -
137Uzbekistan 4 0.1 - 70,000 767 0.52% 22.5 -
138Zambia 2 0.1 - 1,239 40 5.00% 2.3 -
139Syria 2 0.1 - - 25 8.00% 1.4 -
140Malawi 2 0.1 - 231 12 16.67% 0.6 -
141Benin 1 0.1 - - 35 2.86% 3.0 -
142Angola 2 0.1 - - 19 10.53% 0.6 -
143Somalia 1 0.1 - - 21 4.76% 1.3 -
144Congo 5 0.1 - - 60 8.33% 0.7 -
145Myanmar 3 0.1 - 1,406 38 7.89% 0.7 -
146Tanzania 3 0.1 - - 32 9.38% 0.6 -
147Nigeria 10 0.1 - 5,000 318 3.14% 1.6 -
148Sudan 2 0.0 - - 19 10.53% 0.4 -
149Ethiopia 3 0.0 - 3,577 69 4.35% 0.7 -

Another right wing talking point is that we shoudn't trust China's numbers. Well duh. But that does not put us in a much better position. Remember, all countries, especially us, are underestimating their numbers. Many more people than usual are dying in group homes for the elderly, or at home, and are never counted as Covid-19 deaths, even though their families report they were suffering from Covid-19 symptoms before their death. They are simply listed as "cardiac arrest" or "pneumonia" deaths. We don't test dead bodies because we don't even have enough tests for the living.

For example, ten times as many New Yorkers are dying in their homes than normal and they aren't being tested. In New York City, somewhere around 20-25 people die at home on a typical day. But according to City Council Member Mark Levine, who chairs the health committee, between 200 and 215 are dying at home every day at present. As Levine wrote on Twitter, only those “who are known to have a positive coronavirus test have the disease listed as the official cause on their death certificate.” Gothamist reports that the city Medical Examiner’s office “is not testing dead bodies for COVID-19. Instead, they’re referring suspected cases to the city’s health department as ‘probable.’” And those “probable” COVID-19 deaths aren’t included in the tallies. This is not a problem that’s unique to New York. BuzzFeed News reported that “medical professionals around the US [say] that the official numbers of people who have died of COVID-19 are not consistent with the number of deaths they’re seeing on the front lines.” https://www.rawstory.com/2020/04/ten-times-as-many-new-yorkers-are-dying-in-their-homes-than-normal-and-they-arent-being-tested-for-covid-19/

So no, Trump is not doing a good job fighting Covid-19, by any measure.

[Cha]

1. Thank you for this realty check, SunSeeker..

[SunSeeker]

3. Reality is the enemy of right wing bullshit!

[Cha]

9. Yes it is and it will bring them down.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

2. A couple of things come immediately to mind.

One is, population. I think ours is the world's third most populous country.

The other is testing. If we are looking at only those who are tested or hospitalized and then die, yeah, the death rate is frightening. Given that we are still being told that a majority of people have few or no symptoms, and even a lot of people with symptoms are simply not being tested, as terrible as this is, the death rate still isn't so bad. It's just that a lot of people are getting this.

[SunSeeker]

6. By population, we are not even close to China and India, yet they have lower rates.

Not sure why our population comes "immediately to mind." Perhaps you can explain.

Here are the top 7 countries by population (all of whom have lower death rates than us).
China 1,439,323,776
India 1,380,004,385
USA 331,002,651
Indonesia 273,523,615
Pakistan 220,892,340
Brazil 212,559,417
Nigeria 206,139,589

So far, the death rate has been kept as low as it has because as soon as countries have started getting overwhelmed, they shut down their economies to slow the spread. Thanks to CA, Oregon, Washington, who implemented aggressive social distancing early on, we have kept it relatively manageable, but at great cost to our economy. Otherwise, it would be in the hundreds of thousands dead in the US. A few countries, like South Korea, have done the smart thing and instituted universal fast testing, so they could do targeted quarantines, thus avoiding having to shut down their country. Saying "the death rate still isn't so bad" is really missing the lesson here. No country has just let it run rampant through their country without lockdowns/social distancing measures. Every time a country has thought they could do that (i.e. the UK), they changed their minds when the bodies started piling up.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. How confident can we be in their numbers?

And in India, the virus has just barely gotten a foothold. Give it time. It's going to be a true bloodbath there.

[SunSeeker]

13. How confident are you in our numbers?

Are you saying it's all "fake news"?

I'm really at a loss as to what point you're trying to make.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

15. No, I am not saying it is all fake news.

Not by any means. But I am seeing reports from various states in this country indicating that there is less than factual reporting of the numbers.

Perhaps more to the point, even if everyone is reporting as much as they know as soon as they know it, the most important thing is that we are still in the early stages of this Pandemic. Which means there is still a lot left to unfold. Especially in places like India or Africa.

Imagine, if you will, a modern style reporting of the Black Death from somewhere in England in August 1348. It would be very incomplete.

For a bit of perspective, if you get a chance, read The Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. It's about the Black Death in England. Not be be a plot spoiler (and trust me, this isn't) a young woman gets sent back from mid-21st century England to 1328 some small village in England to do historical research. Pretty soon, people start dying all around her and she finally asks the question, "What the fuck year is this?" "1348" she is told, and it all falls into place.

Excellent book. It may or may not shed light on what's happening now, but is still a good. read.

[former9thward]

24. So you trust China's numbers over Cuomo's?

Wow.... Our numbers come from each state's department of public health. I trust them over China.

[SunSeeker]

34. I trust Cuomo's more than China, but even NY's numbers are underreported.

Last edited Sun Apr 12, 2020, 08:33 PM - Edit history (1)

Cuomo would be the first to admit that. As I point out in the OP, way more New Yorkers are dying in their homes than normal and they aren't being tested. In New York City, somewhere around 20-25 people die at home on a typical day. But according to City Council Member Mark Levine, who chairs the health committee, between 200 and 215 are dying at home every day at present. As Levine wrote on Twitter, only those “who are known to have a positive coronavirus test have the disease listed as the official cause on their death certificate.” Gothamist reports that the city Medical Examiner’s office “is not testing dead bodies for COVID-19. Instead, they’re referring suspected cases to the city’s health department as ‘probable.’” And those “probable” COVID-19 deaths aren’t included in the tallies. This is not a problem that’s unique to New York. BuzzFeed News reported that “medical professionals around the US [say] that the official numbers of people who have died of COVID-19 are not consistent with the number of deaths they’re seeing on the front lines.” https://www.rawstory.com/2020/04/ten-times-as-many-new-yorkers-are-dying-in-their-homes-than-normal-and-they-arent-being-tested-for-covid-19/

When it comes to states like Florida and Texas, I trust their numbers less than Cuomo's.

The point is, everyone's numbers are underreported to some degree, some more than others. But the numbers given by international organizations are all we have to go by when comparing countries, so that is what we use. I am specifically using a source you cited for those numbers.

You still think we're "way down the list"?

[former9thward]

42. We are way down the list.

I compare apples with apples, not with oranges. Others may differ...

[SunSeeker]

43. So now that it is obvious the data doesn't support your assertion...

you want to cherry-pick the data "apples" to make it support your conclusion.

But we cannot use alternative facts. Nor alternative fruit. There are only one set of facts. When we are comparing Trump's botched response's death rate to the world, all of the countries of the world are "apples."

You referenced a chart listing all countries in the world, not a personally created cherry-picked list. You did not say the US was "way down on my cherry-picked list of countries." You said the US was "way down the list" and cited https://www.realclearpolitics.com/coronavirus/ as your list. That list shows 94% of the world's countries have a lower per capita death rate than the US.

Your link shows the US is near the top end of the countries with the highest death rates, not "far down" in the bottom half, nor even close to the middle. Sure, there are some European countries with higher death rates than us, but even if you just look at the list of 44 European countries at the link, we are not "far down" on that list either. We're still in the top 25% of per capita deaths. Many European countries have lower death rates than us, like Austria, Germany, Slovenia, Serbia, Slovakia and Czechia (Czech Republic), despite their proximity to disaster zones like Italy (whose travelers NY is blaming in large part for it's own disastrous outbreak).

It makes no sense to limit your comparison to Europe, or your own arbitrarily chosen countries. The comparison must be and is to the world. That is what we are talking about.

[jimfields33]

26. The point is not to trust China's numbers

Please say that you don't. Nobody does.

[SunSeeker]

35. The point is, even if you totally disregard China's numbers, Trump's response has been awful.

Even if you totally disregard China's numbers and assume it's many times our numbers, that still puts us in the worse 13 countries out of 195 in terms of deaths/1M.

[ProfessorGAC]

33. I'm Confident In Our Numbers

CA, NY, IL, OH, PA make up 30% of the population and those governors get good marks for response, and none have shown themselves to be beholden to DOLTUS.
Now, add in MI, MA, WA, & MD, and we've got quite the base of "unfake" numbers.
Last; no I do not for a microsecond believe the numbers out of China. Or Russia.
(Remember, Russia was reporting 16 cases for 6 days. Then they sealed their borders & shut down Moscow. Over 16 cases, country wide? Yeah, sure)

[SunSeeker]

36. I live in CA and love Newsom. But I know our numbers are underreported.

Like in New York, and every other state, we're not counting people who die at home who have never been tested. We don't count many deaths in elderly group homes, unless they were confirmed to have the virus before they died. We simply don't have enough tests to test dead bodies. Those precious tests are reserved for the living. Honestly, I think the only country who is reporting accurate numbers is South Korea, since they have no shortage of tests.

[drray23]

4. 100 % of them dont have Trump as president. nt.

[Cha]

10. They actually care for their people and hulmanity.

We got the sadistic psychopath.

[BigmanPigman]

5. I check out the charts and graphs at this link several times a day

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/worldwide-graphs/

I have been for 2 weeks. I compare "deaths per 1 million pop" for each country and also the individual states. It does not look good for the US. Today I read an article about statistics which uses the same link for stats and this made me hope that the real numbers may be more forthcoming than I had originally thought....

"Meanwhile the CDC is instructing medical staff to report deaths as COVID-19 deaths even when no test has confirmed the presence of the disease."

https://mises.org/wire/march-us-deaths-covid-19-totaled-less-2-percent-all-deaths

[DFW]

8. A word of caution

Here in Europe, it is close to impossible to get tested, and if you are not tested, you don't get into the statistics.

Here in Germany, they have tested MAYBE 3% pf the population by now, and we are one of the most densely populated countries on the continent. I know fo friends both here and across the border in Holland that have had sever symptoms, all of which match COVID-19, but couldn't get tested because they weren't close enough to death. I teird when I got back from Spain, and the Germans shunted me frmo doctor to doctor and agency to agency, and then said no test, just stay home.

As far as Europe goes, the statistics are WILDLY under-reported. Probably in the USA as well, but here? Definitely. Our numbers here are nothing to brag about.

[SunSeeker]

11. Oh please. Germany is testing twice more per capita than the US.

Look at the chart in the OP. It lists the number of tests per country.

Germany has 83.7 million people. They have done 1,317,887 tests. In other words, about 1 in every 63 people have been tested. That is pretty fucking good.

Compare that to US numbers. The US has 331,002,651 people. We have done 2,670,674 tests. In other words, about 1 in every 124 Americans have been tested.

Germany has tested TWICE as many people, per capita, than we have.

[DFW]

16. Here in Germany, we are not impressed

In Düsseldorf, the nearest big town to us, they are testing 800 people a day. That means that in three years, they might have tested everybody. Maybe you in the States find that impressive, but we are not very impressed here. We know of exactly ONE person who tried to get tested who actually managed to, and that was because he is a multimillionaire who has the right connections.

When Americans try to tell us here what a paradise we live in, it is the Europeans who say, "oh, please."

[SunSeeker]

17. Everything is relative. You have universal health coverage. We don't.

That is a big fucking deal. You don't have people dying of Covid-19 with their last words being, "Who will pay for this?" https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=13271992

[DFW]

19. Where in the world did you hear that we had universal health coverage here?

Fox Noise? RT? How much time have you spent here anyway?

It WOULD be a big fucking deal, but only if it were true.

We have no such thing as universal health coverage here in Germany. My wife is a German social worker who spent her entire career looking after people whose health coverage was so poor, or non-existent, as to need assistance to get them out of the cracks they had fallen through. Although I pay my taxes here in Germany, and am in the 50% bracket, I get zero health coverage. Zip. Nada. I was sent to one of the private insurers, who, due to a pre-existing condition, quoted me €2500 a month in premiums, or about $33,000 a year. Slightly above my pay grade. So I kept my Blue Cross from the States, and since they deny everything, I am de facto without health insurance.

We here in Germany are always amazed at how some propaganda sites in the States try to convince people that everything is free here. Nothing is further from the truth. One of my wife's girlfriends who lives in a town 30 minutes north of here receives care packages from her toward the end of the month, because her welfare payment doesn't cover the cost of both food and rent. For that matter, if my wife had to live on her pension alone (€850 a month plus a €150 supplement as a slightly disabled cancer survivor), she'd be eating nothing but lettuce toward the end of the month, herself.

[SunSeeker]

20. Germany does have univsersal multi-payer coverage.

Although many Germans spend money on premiums, Germany still manages to cover 100% of its population. In the United States, about 8.8% of the population remains uninsured, which equates to about 28 million people. Even more Americans are underinsured. No one goes bankrupt in Germany because of medical care costs.
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/germany-s-health-care-system-model-u-s-n1024491

There are subsidies for Germans who cannot afford coverage. And there are not the huge copays/deductibles like in the US.

As you said, you chose to keep your "Blue Cross coverage from the States," so you are covered. You seem to have a odd situation that is not representative of typical German citizens, or even US ex-pats, as demonstrated by the American living in Germany interviewed at the above link. She loves her German health coverage. She is paying a lot less for her insulin; she says drug copays in Germany are never more than 5-10 Euro. She was paying $100/month in the US.

Have you applied to be a German citizen?

[jimfields33]

27. Do you live there? Somebody from Germany gives a on the ground observation

and you knock them down from afar?????????

[SunSeeker]

37. I go by documented evidence.

Germany has a multi-payer system. Although many Germans spend money on premiums, Germany still manages to cover 100% of its population. In the United States, about 8.8% of the population remains uninsured, which equates to about 28 million people. Even more Americans are underinsured. No one goes bankrupt in Germany because of medical care costs. 
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/germany-s-health-care-system-model-u-s-n1024491 

There are subsidies for Germans who cannot afford coverage. And there are not the huge copays/deductibles like in the US. 

As the poster you are referring to said, he chose to keep his "Blue Cross coverage from the States," so he is covered. He seems to have an odd situation that is not representative of typical German citizens, or even US ex-pats, as demonstrated by the American living in Germany interviewed at the above NBC News link. She loves her German health coverage. And says every German she has spoken to would not trade their system for ours. She is paying a lot less for her insulin; she says drug copays in Germany are never more than 5-10 Euro. She was paying $100/month in the US. 

The documented evidence is that Germany has universal health coverage, and we have 28 million uninsured. That makes Germany's system a lot better than ours, that ex-pat's unique experience notwithstanding.

[duforsure]

12. But no other countries have trump

A corrupt self serving serial liar and con man who spends all his time trying to keep from being exposed, and couldn't care less about anyone else except for himself. He has never cared about the health or welfare of the American people, he just cons people into believing he does. It's always about himself , bragging he's doing a great job when he's lazy, incompetent, and a career criminal constantly looking at ways to embezzled money out of the treasury. He's a cancer to our country , and it's still spreading fast.that's why he's such a huge failure now, it's all about himself, and this virus has exposed him.what a failure. How many people will die from trumps forcing people back will insure he loses in Nov. . Trump does care if he kills grandma, if it helps him.

[SunSeeker]

14. Trump is a cancer on the world.

He set a bad example. Many countries followed it, to their detriment. They assumed he knew something they didn't. After all, America is the world's richest country with the best experts. The world thought America would work to stop the global spread, like Obama did with H1N1 and ebola. But Trump left everyone to fend for themselves, he even left his own citizens to fend for themselves. He won't use the powers of the presidency to fight Covid-19, like the Defense Production Act. His neglect is truly criminal.

[BlueMTexpat]

18. Thanks for posting!

I live in #8.

But even the Freddie Mercury statue in Montreux is helping to spread the message.

[SunSeeker]

21. Love it!

I'm a huge Freddy fan.

[customerserviceguy]

22. I've noticed

that developing nations have just started to make the lists, they weren't really much there two weeks ago. When this disease ravages populations in those places, the survival rate in the US will probably not look so bleak.

[SunSeeker]

32. Thousands of dead Americans because of Trump's corruption will ALWAYS look bleak.

We should be comparing ourselves to other wealthy, industrial counties. Countries like Canada, South Korea, Germany and Australia are all doing so much better than us.

The point of the OP is to show what a lie a current right wing talking point is.

Those "Trump responded well" bullshit right wing talking points will still be just just as wrong even if and when those third world countries currently doing better than us take a turn for the worse.

We will still have been shown up by countries like South Korea, when it should have been us setting an example for the world, like we did under Obama with N1H1 and ebola.

[customerserviceguy]

39. All I can say is

if we make the argument about "Trump killed more people than would have died had Hillary been President," we lose. Everything needed to convince the American electorate that Trump has to go was known four months ago, before any of us ever heard of this virus. In fact, the House of Representatives found plenty of reason to impeach him, that had nothing to do with his handling of a crisis.

Here's my fear: They've already high-balled the numbers as a range of between 100K and 240K deaths, the total from the first wave will probably be lower that that. That's a good thing, but Trump's campaign will spin it as "beating the odds". Also, if the second wave doesn't occur until after Election Day, there's a decent chance that the economy will recover enough for the campaign to say, "Let's build this back up to where I had it before this foreign invisible enemy screwed it up."

That may sway swing voters. Impeachment will be a distant memory at that point, unless we drive the message home that Trump is unfit for office in a wide variety of ways.

[SunSeeker]

41. This isn't about comparing Trump to Hillary. It's about comparing Trump to South Korea.

So many countries relied on us to see what to do. They expected to deal with it like Obama dealt with H1N1 and ebola, but Trump did not follow Obama's playbook, and completely botched it.

Trump downplayed it. He politicized it. He left everyone to fend for themselves. He failed to quickly mass produce accurate and fast test kits. He failed to distribute sufficient PPE. He just let it spread for 2 months, until our only option to slow down the deaths was just shut everything down and destroy our economy. 

South Korea turned out to be the model here, and they will be the model for future pandemics. Their leaders were humble, they listened to their epidemiology experts and mobilized their whole country, acting quickly to protect their people, not their political reputations. In the end, they saved both, all without having to shut down and destroy their economy. 

But we can't follow South Korea's testing-intensive, targeted quarantine model. We don't have enough tests, thanks to Trump's botched test rollout. And we don't have a competent leader. That is what we need to make this about.

[KatyMan]

23. Another way to look at this

Deaths per 1 million
USA. 65
Spain 363
Italy 329
France 221
UK 356
Belgium 311
Netherlands 160
Switzerland 128
Sweden 89

[jimfields33]

28. Exactly

Thank you for proving the truth in this whole mess.

[SunSeeker]

31. What is that clappy "truth"? That we're the best of the 12 worst of 195 countries?

[SunSeeker]

30. Any way you look at it, 94% of the world's countries have lower deaths per 1 million. nt

[jmg257]

25. 1) It is not only right wing yacking about "per capitia" even on DU its has been pointed out.

2) we have a ton of selfish ignorant people, who think what is "essential" is up to them to decide. "Stay at home" is too vague, apparently.

[Turbineguy]

29. And 99.49 percent of countries

don't have trump for president.

Coincidence? I think not.

[Celerity]

38. The US is actually 14th, that link left off San Marino and Andorra (micro states, but your OP

counts Saint Maarten, which is the Dutch side of a split Caribbean (Saint Martin is the French side) which is only 41,000 in population and shot up the charts today due to 7 deaths (they had 2).

If you take away microstates, the US is the 11th worst in terms of deaths per 1m pops, and will keep on climbing I fear, especially if Rump opens up the country in 17 days or so.


https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

[SunSeeker]

40. What's so sad is so many countries relied on us to see what to do, and Trump completely botched it.

Trump downplayed it. He politicized it. He left everyone to fend for themselves. He failed to quickly mass produce accurate and fast test kits. He failed to distribute sufficient PPE. He just let it spread for 2 months, until our only option to slow down the deaths was just shut everything down and destroy our economy.

South Korea turned out to be the model here, and they will be the model for future pandemics. Their leaders were humble, they listened to their epidemiology experts and mobilized their whole country, acting quickly to protect their people, not their political reputations. In the end, they saved both, all without having to shut down and destroy their economy.

But we can't follow South Korea's testing-intensive, targeted quarantine model. We don't have enough tests, thanks to Trump's botched test rollout. And we just don't have a competent national leader.