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As of Aug. 28, more than 180,000 Americans have died from COVID-19. That is the largest number of deaths of any country in the world. The U.S. has 4 percent of the world’s population, but 25 percent of the world’s COVID-19 deaths.

Recent projections predict that by Dec. 1, the death toll from COVID-19 is likely to be in the range of 300,000 Americans.

The reason that the U.S. has the highest number of COVID-19 deaths in the world is that Donald Trump has failed to take the necessary steps to control the spread of this illness. He initially denied the seriousness of COVID-19, claiming that it would miraculously “disappear.” Not only did the virus not disappear, it spread rapidly through many states in our country, causing an escalating number of illnesses and deaths.

Public health officials urged all Americans to stay home as much as possible, to socially distance from others, to wear masks when in contact with anyone outside of their families and to regularly wash our hands. These measures succeeded in temporarily slowing down the spread of the virus. But then Donald Trump began to insist that states had to “open up,” that social distancing and mask wearing were optional. In a very short period of time, infection and death rates began to climb once again.

Currently, Trump is insisting that students must return to school in person, regardless of the infection rate in their communities. Some schools and colleges have attempted to do that — predictably, many of them have seen a large spike in COVID-19 infections.   

Donald Trump’s failure to take the necessary steps to control the spread of COVID-19 has led to many thousands of preventable deaths and will lead to many thousands more in the months ahead.

Trump is an incompetent and dangerous president. For the safety of our nation, he must be voted out of office on Nov. 3.

Gretta Van Bree

Lincoln Township