The public health response to the WA1 case in Washington state and the particularly impressive response to an early outbreak in Germany delayed local COVID-19 outbreaks by a few weeks and bought crucial time for U.S. and European cities, as well as those in other countries, to prepare for the virus when it finally did arrive. A few weeks might seem a small difference in response time, but it wasn’t. “The value of detecting cases early, before they have bloomed into an outbreak, cannot be overstated in a pandemic situation.”
