Donald Trump declared victory on coronavirus testing without talking much about the 80,000 Americans who’ve died of COVID-19 so far. Another thing he didn’t talk about at that Monday press briefing? An unreleased coronavirus task force report finding that infection rates have spiked in new areas in what the media and politicians like to call the heartland.
The May 7 report shows a week-over-week increase of 72.4% or greater in 10 top areas including Nashville, Tennessee; Des Moines, Iowa; Amarillo, Texas; and Central City, Kentucky. That last city had a 650% increase—a huge percentage increase from a low starting point, but the thing about exponential growth is that the raw numbers are small until they suddenly aren’t.
“Locations to watch” include Charlotte, North Carolina; Kansas City, Missouri; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Montgomery, Alabama; Columbus, Ohio; Phoenix, Arizona; and both Lincoln and Omaha, Nebraska.
You wouldn’t know any of that to listen to either Trump or Republican senators like Rand Paul, who said at a Senate hearing Tuesday, “Really, outside of New England, we've had a relatively benign course for this virus nationwide. And I think the one-size-fits-all that we could have a national strategy and nobody is gonna go to school is kind of ridiculous.”
Even if you discount the possibility that the virus could continue to spread, what is this “relatively benign outside of New England” business? For one thing, neither New York nor New Jersey is in New England, and they lead the nation for deaths. Other non-New England states with more than 1,000 deaths include Illinois, California, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Texas, Florida, Maryland, Georgia, Louisiana, Indiana, and Ohio. And while Paul might discount Illinois, California, and Maryland as practically New England on account of being blue states, and he might discount Michigan, Louisiana, and Georgia as not counting because COVID-19 is so disproportionately killing Black people in those states … well, that still leaves a lot of deaths a Republican like Rand Paul should at least pretend to care about.
And if that unreleased report showing big increases in the proverbial heartland is accurate, and if the Trump administration continues its path of incompetence in fighting the spread of the disease, and Republican governors keep pushing to reopen before it’s safe to do so … if those things are even partially true, then the U.S. is in for a long, long summer.