Don’t forget Puerto Rico

The months-long uncertainty surrounding the death toll from Hurricane Maria highlights the confounding limitations of using fatalities to gauge the true impact of a disaster.

Even if the death count in Puerto Rico had in fact stood at 64, the early estimate put out by the Puerto Rican government, that number would say nothing about the prolonged suffering of the hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens who were left without electricity for months after the hurricane. Or about those who struggled to access medical care and clean water long after the storm subsided.

Still, many people were stunned by survey results published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine that found the Sept. 20 storm’s death toll could be 70 times the official estimate.

Anywhere between 793 and 8,498 people may have died in the hurricane and its aftermath, with the midpoint estimated at 4,645 possible deaths, according to the team led by Harvard researchers. Among the households surveyed, one-third of the deaths reported were attributed to delays in accessing medical care after the storm.

A low death toll would not have excused the U.S. government’s slow response to the disaster, which engulfed the U.S. territory that is home to 3.4 million Americans.

Hurricane season is descending once again on the Caribbean, while Puerto Rico is still struggling to recover. Thousands on the island remain without power, a testament to Maria’s long-lasting effects and the island’s poverty.

Whether Hurricane Maria killed a few dozen Americans or 4,600 after it slammed into Puerto Rico last year, the U.S. government’s inefficient response should go down in history as a shameful episode that must not be repeated.