The number of COVID-19 infections in the US reached 33.8 million on Monday, with deaths exceeding 600,000. 

Yet on June 28, on Bloomberg’s updated COVID-19 resilience ranking list the US surged to No.1, with flight capacity recovery and vaccinated travel routes as two additional metrics reflecting reopening progress.

It is always easy to play word games and rank countries in whatever order the person making the ranking chooses. However, this No.1 spot won’t bring 600,000 dead Americans back, nor will it help the 33.8 million infected Americans recover. In some sense, a COVID-19 resilience list that puts the US first is a rejection of the facts.

During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the US government’s failure was obvious. When the first infections emerged, it failed to take timely control measures to prevent the virus from spreading. When infections became widespread, it hesitated between lockdown and resuming production, and failed even to bring the divided US society to a consensus on wearing masks to prevent the virus from spreading.

Further, when COVID-19 vaccines finally emerged, the US kept a monopoly over their produced ones, even though people from developing countries are in dire need of vaccines. Its “generous” donation of 80 vials of vaccines to Trinidad and Tobago are still laughed at by US people, who themselves felt that same desperation.

Instead of examining their own wrongs and correcting them, US politicians passed the buck to others by inventing conspiracy theories. Ironically, China is the first country that brought the pandemic under control, and in turn sent a helping hand to the whole world, the US included.

Where human lives are concerned, there is only one metric that matters, namely the health of the people. To save lives and prevent more lives from being harmed should be the No.1 principle in fighting the virus, and no “metric” is an excuse for failure there.

Over 27 million people in the US are struggling to recover from COVID-19, while 300 million there are struggling to avoid infection. It’s time for US politicians to take firmer measures in protecting their people, instead of being proud of being ranked No.1 by a domestic media outlet.

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