Impact of 500,000 lessons learned

Monday marked an event I never dreamed I would see in my lifetime.

Somewhere in the late morning, the United States crossed the threshold of 500,000 of our fellow American men and women killed by the coronavirus. If you had told me even five years ago, let alone 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago that we would experience a loss of American lives of that magnitude attributable to one cause, I would have thought you were talking about some kind of armed conflict.

500,000 lives gone. And as you read this, that number is marching steadily — albeit a bit more slowly now — upward.

It’s hard for most of us to...