Technically it was directly the result of our government not wanting to deal with the issue and making it political rather than scientific. Trump could have easily said wear a mask, follow the guidelines, let's take our time to reopen, let's make sure that we pump additional money into the system sooner rather than later, because if we will end up pumping it anyway, but this way we avoid foreclosures, rent evictions, homelessness, and all of that will lead to poverty and increased lawlessness.
There's plenty that could have been done to contain the virus. Yes America is much larger in geography and population than Europe, but Italy, Spain, Germany, all have shown that you can contain the virus.
If our leadership actually united around what was best for America rather than fighting each other, we could have certainly improved where we are today. By the end of this week we will be hitting 75k new cases and we are full bore into the second wave.
Yet, the President still won't put on a mask in public, won't call people out on it, it's gotten so bad that even his lackey VP Pence has finally said it's a good idea to put the mask on.
America has become extremely divided and it is because of the media. On both sides. You have FoxNews that paints a narrative that ignores all science, and you have the left media that is all too happy to jump on any little issue that makes Trump look bad and heighten it out of proportion and then as a result the right fights back even harder.