IF CRISIS REVEALS character, as the saying goes, it can also reveal contrast. In America, the two most populous states-California (the largest Democratic state) and Texas (its Republican rival)-have adopted strikingly different approaches to managing the pandemic. How well they have fared is significant to the health of the nation, since one-fifth of Americans live in the two states. Their relative fortunes also show how hard it is for states, which are in charge of America's response to covid-19, to get the trade-offs right between lock-downs, economic damage and the spread of the virus-and show the limits of public policy when state borders are porous. Texas, ever sceptical of government, has taken a lighter-touch approach to public-health measures. Last year Greg Abbott, the governor, was slow to issue a mask mandate and fought cities and counties that wanted to implement stricter rules. Texas did issue a stay-at-home-order, but it was one of the first states to reopen, doing so even earlier than Donald Trump's White House suggested. Cases spiked.
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