The virus hit every corner of America, devastating dense cities and rural counties through waves that hit one region and then another.
In New York City, more than 28,000 people died of the virus – or about one in 295 people. In Los Angeles County, the number of victims is about one in 500 people. In Lamb County, Texas, where 13,000 people live spread out over 1,000 square miles, the loss is one in 163 people.
The virus has spread to nursing homes and other long-term care facilities, spreading easily among vulnerable residents: they are responsible for more than 163,000 deaths, about a third of the country’s total.
Virus deaths have also disproportionately affected Americans along racial lines. Overall, the mortality rate for black Americans with Covid-19 was almost twice that of white Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; the death rate for Hispanics was 2.3 times higher than for white Americans. And for Native Americans, it was 2.4 times higher.
As of Monday, about 1,900 Covid deaths were being reported, on average, most days – below more than 3,300 at peak points in January. The slowdown was a relief, but scientists said the variants make it difficult to project the future of the pandemic, and historians warned against the risk of avoiding the scale of the country’s losses.
“There will be a real impulse to say, ‘See how we’re doing,'” said Nancy Bristow, head of the history department at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Wash., And author of “American Pandemic: The Lost Worlds of the 1918 Influenza Epidemic. But she cautioned against trends now to “rewrite this story into another story of American triumph.”