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Jennifer Ann Jones, known as the Dance Queen, on the streets of New Orleans. A photo essay depicts a city growing accustomed to emptier spaces. Page A11.

ANNIE FLANAGAN FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

D I S T A N C I N G

Charles M. Blow PAGE A23

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A22-23

In Nepal’s mountain villages, droughtsand barren farmland have forced manyto seek lower altitude. PAGE A19

INTERNATIONAL A19-20

Fleeing Warming HimalayasBill Withers treated his utterly distinc-tive voice as a vehicle, not a center-piece, and wrote songs with remarkablecompassion, Jon Pareles says. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-6

Somebody to Lean OnShifting sick-leave policy and communi-cation issues anger workers as the coro-navirus spreads in facilities. PAGE B1

BUSINESS B1-8

Amazon’s Response Falls Flat

The U.S. military is asking Congress for$20 billion over five years to counterChina’s regional ambitions. PAGE A20

Vying for Clout in Asia-Pacific

Efforts by grass-roots groups to helpcandidates in down-ballot races arebeing foiled by the outbreak. PAGE A21

NATIONAL A21, 24

A Setback for Progressives

Michael McKinnell’s sculptural andpublic-minded design helped spur thecityscape’s revival in the late 1960s.He was 84. PAGE D6

OBITUARIES D6-7

Architect of Boston City Hall

With no toes on his right foot, TomDempsey made a 63-yard field goal forthe Saints in 1970. He was 73. PAGE D7

Record-Setting N.F.L. KickerThe star-studded Hollywood party forthe short-video platform was canceled.But the app is still going live. PAGE B1

Quibi’s Debut in a Pandemic

Rui Hachimura, a rookie forward withthe Washington Wizards, has foundcomfort in the hit Japanese reality show“Terrace House” and even sat in as aguest commentator. PAGE D1

SPORTSMONDAY D1-5

A Taste of Home in Reality TV

As the Loyola-Chicago team chaplain,Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt became acollege basketball celebrity two yearsago. Now, at 100, she helps players put ahealth crisis in perspective. PAGE D3

Joyful, Joyful: That’s Sister Jean

As the surgeon general told thenation to brace for “our Pearl Har-bor moment” of cascading coro-navirus deaths this week, severalgovernors said on Sunday thattheir states were in urgent need offederal help and complained thatthey had been left to compete forcritical equipment in the absenceof a consistent strategy and co-ordination from the Trump admin-istration.

Some clearly walked a delicatepath, criticizing what they saw asan erratic, inadequate federal re-sponse, while also trying to avoidalienating the White House asstates vie with one another for re-sources both from Washingtonand on the market that can meanthe difference between life anddeath.

“I’m grateful for the help thatwe’ve gotten,” Gov. GretchenWhitmer of Michigan, a Demo-crat, said in an appearance on“Fox News Sunday.” But she alsoexpressed her alarm over whatshe described as “not having a na-tional strategy where there is onepolicy for the country as opposedto a patchwork based on who thegovernor is.”

The result, she added, “is creat-ing a more porous situation whereCovid-19 will go longer and morepeople will get sick.”

Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington,also a Democrat, was blunter inhis depiction of a chaotic federalresponse. “This is ludicrous thatwe do not have a national effort inthis,” Mr. Inslee said in an inter-view on “Meet the Press” on NBC.“To say, ‘we’re a backup’ — Imean, the surgeon general allud-ed to Pearl Harbor. Can you imag-ine if Franklin Delano Rooseveltsaid: ‘I’ll be right behind you, Con-necticut. Good luck building thosebattleships’?”

President Trump at a news con-

AS DEATHS SURGE,GOVERNORS PLEADWITH WASHINGTON

Clamor for More Aidand Coordination

By RICK ROJASand VANESSA SWALES

Other U.S. metros

March 15 March 22 March 29

THE NEW YORK TIMES

Source: New York Times database of reports from state and local health agencies, hospitals and C.D.C. data.

4 per week

3 per week

2 per week

1 per week

Detroitmetro

Seattlemetro

New Orleansmetro

New York Citymetro area

Cases Keep ClimbingCoronavirus cases are growing in New York, New Orleans, Detroit and dozens of other metropolitan areas.

New confirmed cases Per 1,000 residents

Lombardy regionof Italy

Continued on Page A16

WASHINGTON — A coroner inIndiana wanted to know if the co-ronavirus had killed a man inearly March, but said that herhealth department denied a test.Paramedics in New York City saythat many patients who died athome were never tested for the co-ronavirus, even if they showedtelltale signs of infection.

In Virginia, a funeral directorprepared the remains of threepeople after health workers cau-tioned her that they each hadtested positive for the coro-navirus. But only one of the threehad the virus noted on the deathcertificate.

Across the United States, evenas coronavirus deaths are beingrecorded in terrifying numbers —many hundreds each day — thetrue death toll is probably muchhigher.

More than 9,400 people with thecoronavirus have been reportedto have died in this country as ofSunday, but hospital officials, doc-tors, public health experts andmedical examiners say that offi-cial counts have failed to capturethe true number of Americans dy-ing in this pandemic. The under-count is a result of inconsistentprotocols, limited resources and apatchwork of decision-makingfrom one state or county to thenext.

In many rural areas, coronerssay they do not have the tests theyneed to detect the disease. Doc-tors now believe that some deathsin February and early March, be-fore the coronavirus reached epi-demic levels in the United States,were probably misidentified as in-fluenza or described only as pneu-monia.

With no uniform system for re-porting deaths related to the coro-navirus in the United States, and acontinued shortage of tests, some

A Count Understatesthe True U.S. Toll

By SARAH KLIFFand JULIE BOSMAN

Lina Evans, the coroner in Shelby County, Ala., said she was now suspicious of a surge in deaths in her county earlier this year, manyinvolving severe pneumonia. She wonders about how big a part the coronavirus, which wasn’t being tested for, may have played.

BOB MILLER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page A8

WASHINGTON — For days, hefended off fears that the contagionwould spread unchecked throughhis crew. Then last week, the cap-tain of the aircraft carrier Theo-dore Roosevelt, who had appealedto his superiors for help, was fired.

By Sunday, friends said, he hadcome down with the coronavirushimself.

The military has long adheredto a rigid chain of command andtolerated no dissent expressedoutside official channels. Capt.Brett E. Crozier, the skipper of theaircraft carrier, knew he was upagainst those imperatives when

he asked for help for nearly 5,000crew members trapped in a petridish of a warship in the middle of apandemic.

But colleagues say the mistakethat could cost Captain Crozier hiscareer was charging headlonginto the Trump administration’snarrative that it had everythingunder control.

Pentagon officials said that al-though President Trump never or-dered Captain Crozier dismissed,

Navy Captain, Fired After Dissent, Is Now SickBy ERIC SCHMITTand JOHN ISMAY

Quarantined in Guam,With Career Adrift

Continued on Page A16

The 2020 edition of the Conser-vative Political Action Conferencein Oxon Hill, Md., in February of-fered a theme-park version ofwhat was to be President Trump’sre-election message: Under thebanner of “America vs. Socialism,”the convention featured anti-Marx branded popcorn, an RVemblazed with the words “Social-ism Takes Capitalism Creates”

and a children’s book promotingpersonal freedom and private-property rights.

Speeches included tiradesagainst big government and“Medicare for all.”

“The virus is not going to sink

the American economy,” the presi-dent’s chief economic adviser,Larry Kudlow, told a packed audi-torium. “What is or could sink theAmerican economy is the social-ism coming from our friends onthe other side of the aisle.” Mr.Trump, the keynote speaker, pro-claimed, “We are defeating theradical, socialist Democrats” who“want total control.”

Four weeks later, with the coro-navirus sinking the American

Virus Battle Shreds the Right’s Political PlaybookBy JIM RUTENBERG Disdain for ‘Socialism’

Collides With Crisis

Continued on Page A10

LONDON — Prime MinisterBoris Johnson was hospitalizedon Sunday evening after 10 daysof battling the coronavirus, un-nerving a country that had gath-ered to watch Queen Elizabeth IIrally fellow Britons to confront thepandemic and reassure them thatwhen the crisis finally ebbed, “wewill meet again.”

The British government saidthat Mr. Johnson would be under-going tests and that he would con-tinue to carry out his duties.

But the uncertainty generatedby his persistent illness under-scored the sense of crisis that ledthe queen to address the countryin a rare televised speech thatevoked the darkest days of WorldWar II.

“I am speaking to you at what Iknow is an increasingly challeng-ing time,” the queen said. “A dis-ruption that has brought grief tosome, financial difficulties tomany, and enormous changes tothe daily lives of us all.”

Her remarks were taped atWindsor Castle, where she has se-questered herself against a virusthat has infected at least 40,000people in Britain, including hereldest son and heir, PrinceCharles, and other senior Britishofficials besides Mr. Johnson.

Speaking in terms both person-al and historical, the queen lik-ened the enforced separation ofBritain’s lockdown to the sacri-fices families made during WorldWar II, when parents sent awaytheir children for their own safety.She urged a country that has ap-proached these measures withsome nonchalance to commit it-self to the cause.

“Today, once again, many willfeel a painful sense of separationfrom their loved ones,” the queen

Queen InvokesBritish ResolveAs Premier Ails

By MARK LANDLER

Continued on Page A6

Twelve doctors at her hospitaland the chief executive were sick-ened with the coronavirus. A col-league had died. Patients asyoung as 19 were being placed onventilators.

But Michele Acito, the directorof nursing at Holy Name MedicalCenter, in the hardest-hit town inNew Jersey’s hardest-hit county,felt like she was holding up.

Then her mother-in-law, sister-in-law and brother-in-law arrived.

The disease that has crippledNew York City is now envelopingNew Jersey’s densely packed cit-ies and suburbs. The state’s gov-ernor said on Friday that New Jer-sey was about a week behind New

York, where scenes of panickeddoctors have gripped the nation.

Hospitals in the state arescrambling to convert cafeteriasand pediatric wings into intensivecare units. Ventilators are runninglow. One in three nursing homeshas at least one resident with thevirus.

At Holy Name in Teaneck, justacross the Hudson River fromManhattan, two doctors areamong the 150 patients being

treated for the virus. The ages ofthe 41 people on ventilators oneday last week ranged from 19 to90.

Twenty patients died in 72hours.

One of them was Edna Acito,Ms. Acito’s mother-in-law.

She had turned 89 on Thursday.It was a bittersweet day with ateam of medical workers singing“Happy Birthday” from the hall-way, just outside a modified doormade from plastic sheathing and azipper.

No visitors were allowed in. Butthe older woman’s nine childrenexpressed their love through aniPad as Ms. Acito held her hand.She died early Saturday.

“You compartmentalize,” Ms.

Horror for a Nurse as 3 Relatives Are Brought InBy TRACEY TULLY Virus Tightens Grip on

New Jersey’s Citiesand Suburbs

Continued on Page A18

VOL. CLXIX . . . No. 58,655 © 2020 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, MONDAY, APRIL 6, 2020

Late EditionToday, mostly sunny, high 66. To-night, partly cloudy in the evening,turning cloudy late, low 48. Tomor-row, sunshine and clouds, high 63.Weather map appears on Page D8.

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