If New York is going to be held up as the model, every officeholder in the country has a new road-map for handling the virus: See a significant percentage of residents of your largest city get infected, barely prevent your hospital system from getting overwhelmed, implement a policy that increases infections and deaths at nursing homes, suffer more than 30,000 deaths and a higher per-capita death rate than any country in the world — and then, after all that, get hailed as a hero.

If it worked for Cuomo, why not every other governor in the nation?

In fairness, New York had many factors working against it. It was hit first, while the virus and how to treat it were still poorly understood, and New York City is an international travel hub with densely packed neighborhoods and a heavily trafficked public-transit system. Of course it got hammered…

It is in a better situation now, but only after the virus burned through much of the city. A state survey found that more than 20 percent of New York City residents have antibodies to the virus. At clinics in some hard-hit neighborhoods about 60 percent of people have tested positive for antibodies. This isn’t an experience anyone should want to duplicate.