Pandemic Following Predicted Course

To the Editor:

It has ben four months since the Herald published my account of the likely stages of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States (“A Nonpolitical Historical Approach to Epidemic Disease Stages,” March 19, 2020).

In general, although I did not provide specific time frames for the stages, the pandemic has followed those stages and the actions associated with each stage. In particular, I noted that blaming is characteristically a part of the responses to a pandemic – certainly something that has occurred over the last four months.

However, I did not anticipate that the fundamental ways of controlling a pandemic, such as washing hands, social distancing, quarantining, and mask-wearing, would be widely disputed, ignored, or opposed. In my view that is the reason why the coronavirus pandemic is at this time (mid-July) uncontrolled in much of the United States.

Darwin H. Stapleton, Ph.D.

Executive Director

Emeritus

Rockefeller Archive

Center