A man wears a mask as he sits in Times Square in New York City on March 12, 2020. | Gary Hershorn/Corbis via Getty Images

The US’s coronavirus epidemic is among the worst. Here’s what you need to know.

It’s now clear the United States has failed to contain its Covid-19 epidemic, with case counts far ahead of other developed nations and more than 1,000 deaths reported a day for over two weeks and counting.

Asked if America’s coronavirus outbreak is the worst in the world, White House adviser and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony Fauci admitted it was on August 5: “Yeah, it is. Quantitatively, if you look at it, it is. I mean, the numbers don’t lie.”

It didn’t have to be this way. In March and April, other developed countries had significant Covid-19 outbreaks, but they did