Matthew C. Nisbet is professor of communication at Northeastern University. He also writes at his blog www.wealthofideas.org and can be found on Twitter @ MCNisbet.
A cross a few weeks in mid-March, American life was remade—whether temporarily or permanently, no one could say for sure. To stem the spread of the COVID-19 virus, states and cities closed schools and nonessential businesses, ordering more than 280 million Americans to shelter at home. With much of the economy coming to a sudden halt, the U.S. jobless rate quickly climbed to its highest level since the Great Depression as more than 22 million Americans filed for unemployment. By mid-April, even with social distancing restrictions in place, there had been 50,000 confirmed U.S. deaths. “The COVID-19 disease is highly contagious, selectively lethal, often indistinguishable from colds and seasonal maladies,” wrote The Wall Street Journal. “For many, the isolation has been compounded by uncertainty. There aren’t enough tests. There aren’t enough hospital beds with ventilators. There is no vaccine, and no cure” (O’Brien and Bauerlein 2020).