Coronavirus Growth in Western Countries: May 17 Update

Here’s the coronavirus death toll through May 17. Reporting is a little spotty on weekends pretty much everywhere, and with that taken into account there are no big changes. Still, with the exceptions of Germany and Switzerland, it sure looks like it’s hard to make that last bit of decline to get below a rate of 1 new death per million. I suspect it’s because the pressure to loosen social distancing restrictions gets too strong to ignore once you’ve made significant progress but before you’ve truly crushed the curve.
The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here. The Public Health Agency of Sweden is here.