As the Omicron wave continues to take thousands of lives each day, the NY Times reports that COVID-19 is “killing Americans at far higher rates than people in other wealthy nations.” According to the Times, “Since Dec. 1, the share of Americans who have been killed by the coronavirus is at least 63 percent higher than in any of these other large, wealthy nations.”

Democratic propaganda calls this a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” to conceal the Biden administration’s horribly inadequate vaccine-only strategy and its reckless claim that the pandemic would end by July 4th, 2021. Republican propaganda frames this as an issue of personal liberty, discouraging vaccines, masks, and other mitigation measures — thus killing more people. Beyond the spin, the truth is more sinister:

In America, this is a pandemic of poverty and capitalism, with both ruling parties responsible for hundreds of thousands of preventable coronavirus deaths.

The fed up Chef @TheChefsGardens

In 2021 @POTUS broke every promise and opted for brutal capitalism instead #COVID19

Michael @OmanReagan

In 2020 @JoeBiden ran on: Widely available free testing Paid sick & care leave for all Policy set by public health, not politicians Assistance for workers & small business Free COVID treatments for all Food relief for all Child care & remote learning ... https://t.co/ZW2qDTsbHI

January 3rd 2022

27 Retweets83 Likes

Dr. Victoria Dooley @DrDooleyMD

Trump: Stop testing and COVID cases will disappear. Biden: You can get a test if you can find and afford one but we DGAF you’re going right back to work, Jack, and don’t ask us for shit b/c there is no federal solution.

January 13th 2022

611 Retweets3,805 Likes

Walker Bragman @WalkerBragman

The U.S. reported 3.5k COVID deaths yesterday. Our federal government should be sending out stimulus checks, providing PUA, guaranteeing paid sick leave, freezing evictions, promoting remote work, freezing rent/mortgage payments, etc. But instead, we're debating masking.

Jorge A. Caballero, MD (jorgecaballero.eth) @DataDrivenMD

Dropping mask mandates at this point is like telling the public they can stop wearing seatbelts while emergency crews are still pulling bodies from the wreckage of 100-car pileup 🤦🏻‍♂️ https://t.co/zJeB8bsCO9

February 2nd 2022

1 Retweet14 Likes

Consider this statistic buried in the NY Times article above: “Surveys suggest that the poorest Americans are the likeliest to remain unvaccinated, putting them at greater risk of dying from Covid.” Contrast that with the fact that the obscene wealth of the world’s 10 richest men DOUBLED during the pandemic.

Ryan Knight ☭ @ProudSocialist

New Oxfam Report: The world’s 10 richest billionaires doubled their wealth during the pandemic while 99% of humanity saw their incomes fall and 160 million more people were forced into poverty. THE CAPITALIST STATE USED A PANDEMIC TO FUNNEL EVEN MORE MONEY TO THE RULING CLASS.

January 19th 2022

261 Retweets713 Likes

We Can Build A Better World 🕊 @BreeNewsome

This might be the most callous talking point I’ve ever seen from this government. It’s not just that they argue that the economy is stronger but that they treat it like a competition. On our way to a million dead but what matters most is the money the billionaires made. https://t.co/tpdxXzoYG6

President Biden @POTUS

Here’s the deal: America is the only leading economy in the world where the economy as a whole is stronger than before the pandemic. Our economic plans are working.

January 24th 2022

1,793 Retweets9,000 Likes

Laura Miers @LauraMiers

“We enter 2022 witnessing the biggest increase in billionaire wealth since records began. A billionaire was created every 26 hours during this pandemic. The wealth of the world’s 10 richest men alone has doubled, rising at a rate of $15,000 per second.” The pandemic is birthing billionaires and killing the poorThe past two years have unleashed unprecedented economic violence.aljazeera.com

January 26th 2022

172 Retweets362 Likes

At every level and at every step, the United States has prioritized capital over human lives. Trump, Biden, and their respective parties have been abject failures at protecting working class Americans, while they’ve been wildly successful at serving the ultra-rich and powerful. This approach has killed people.

Signs of the duopoly’s callous and deadly pandemic policy are everywhere. In a mask-off moment, Connecticut’s (Democratic) Governor Ned Lamont, who has stubbornly refused to allow schools a temporary remote learning option, recently called Omicron a “little mini-surge.” How is that different from an anti-vaxxer minimizing the virus?

And it’s not just domestic policy where the U.S. has valued money over lives. POLITICO reporter Myah Ward writes, “with no coherent plan to vaccinate the world, especially the Southern Hemisphere or the Global South, we’ve allowed new variants of concern to emerge.” VICE reports that “open-source vaccines got more funding from Tito’s Vodka than the government.”

The countless victims of the U.S. government’s atrocious pandemic policy — the vast majority of whom come from vulnerable populations — are unlikely to see justice. Mass death is acceptable in America. So is a mass disabling event like long COVID. The ruling class never pays a price for preserving this monstrous system. Capitalist criminals are running the show, and that won’t change anytime soon.

UPDATE (2/3/22)

POLITICO reports that Team Biden is preparing for another “mission accomplished” moment on COVID-19:

The preparations are designed to capitalize on a break in the monthslong Covid-19 surge, with officials anticipating a spring lull that could boost the nation’s mood and lift President Joe Biden’s approval ratings at a critical moment for his party.

Biden and his top health officials have already begun hinting at an impending “new normal,” in a conscious messaging shift meant to get people comfortable with a scenario where the virus remains widespread yet at more manageable levels.