Second Wave - Coronavirus/Covid has begun!

[Merlin]

Simple masks are proven to stop the virus though it takes time when you start with a high infection count.  Sweden left its economy open, never shut down and now death rates per day are under 10.

Well, they did shut down their schools, required everyone to wear masks in public, and asked their higher-risk population to self-isolate. Their death rates skyrocketed for a while but are now coming down. Of course, they also tend to be healthier (less obesity, which is a major risk factor) and their population is cooperating. They don't have all the covid-deniers and anti-mask movements that we have in the US which is going to make things much worse here.

In July we are finally seeing a major shift on states/cities requiring masks.  So the peak may be near.

I hope you're right. I'm skeptical based on observation.

If you want to knock down the virus quicker, then using pool testing to test every single person is the best way to do that.  The U.S. has started pool testing though not fully committed to it.  We need to be testing 10-20 million people per day.

Agreed. Pool testing, contact tracing, and isolation are going to be key to shutting this down. But I don't know that the US population is willing to do what it takes to make that happen.

We're going to need to keep all that up until we have a working vaccine (assuming we manage that) now that we know that herd immunity isn't possible. Of course, considering that Covid antibodies from natural infection appear to fade after a few months, even after we get a working vaccine we're likely going to need regular boosters until we are able to eliminate the disease for good.