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When you read that there have been over 67,000 American deaths and over a million reported infections, it seems shocking. It also feels hugely worrying that Russia has over 145,000 diagnosed sufferers. Nevertheless, the fact is the US is a big country, with 328 million people. Russia is even larger, of course, but has a smaller population of 146 million. So although these figures are enormous, they don't tell the whole story, especially given both nations have done huge amounts of tests: over 7 million in the US and more than 4.3 million across Russia.
By comparison, Ukraine has only tested 134,592 people, according to its own government's data, and Brazil's tally is under 400,000 on the Worldometer aggregator. This information is key to understanding the real spread of coronavirus in any given country - because, like everything, it's all relative.
Comment: A similar look at internal U.S. politics dictating how to interpret respective numbers in states like Florida (R) and California (D):
- CNN uses coronavirus double standard to slam Republican governor - but stats show Florida no worse than California, better than NY
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