One of the problems with burn through is that at some point it would become politically impossible—even if attempted.
No western government (and we will have to see about dictatorships) can survive mass casualties and total collapse of the health care system, even if they wanted to go there.
That is why Boris finally threw in the towel on it—his staff just ran the numbers and told him he would be voted out of office at best—and hung from a London street corner at worst.
France reports 2,446 new cases of coronavirus and 240 new deaths, raising total to 22,302 cases and 1,100 dead
https://twitter.com/BNODesk/status/1242526785138503688
Can we get those same people to run the numbers for Trump?
If he goes the “open the economy” route, not only will he crash the economy ANYWAY (because of millions of sick and / or dead Americans), but he’ll also have that hung around his neck.
He’s in a tough spot for sure, but has two choices: open the economy and crash the healthcare system - and shortly thereafter, the economy, OR crash the economy and try to preserve the healthcare system.
Neither choice is “good”, but the answer SHOULD be obvious. It’s terrifying that he can’t see what is so blatantly clear.