First Thing: six months into the Covid-19 pandemic, 150,000 Americans are dead

Good morning. Six months since the very first cases of Covid-19 were diagnosed in China, more than 150,000 Americans are now dead – by far the biggest toll of any nation afflicted by the raging global pandemic. The US has seen more than 4.3 million infections, with an early surge in New York and the north-east followed by outbreaks across the sun belt, which now threaten to progress to central states, thanks in part to the fumbling response of…