This whole thing stinks to high heaven. At most so far 59 people have died, with most of them being in one nursing home in Kirkland WA. The media is fear mongering harder than ever to make orange man look bad. Schools and businesses are closing which is sure to send us into recession if not worse. Out of 330,000,000 people, 59 have died in the US and everything is screeching to a halt. Something isn't right here but it's fucking everything up. The economy was the best it's ever been in the history of our country and now everything is going to shit because of less than 100 deaths. More people probably die each year from skiing accidents. This is un fucking believable.
EDIT: I'm not saying this is a total hoax. I'm saying the media overreaction is making things way worse than they have to be. Panicking is never going to make anything better. If this is truly as bad as some of you are saying, I hope it justifies sending our economy into great depression 2 Corona boogaloo
Public health agencies already have the power to forcibly quarantine someone with a contagious disease, especially one with no effective treatment. They do it for tuberculosis, and people have been arrested for defying it.
My county in Texas has imposed a home quarantine on about two dozen people, because they were either in a country with a COVID-19 epidemic, or were known to be in close contact with someone who tested positive. So far, all have either completed the 14-day quarantine without symptoms, tested negative after becoming symptomatic, or are still in quarantine. There have been no confirmed cases so far, and we are on the periphery of a major metro area.
The OP's point is that if the current measures (which are inconvenient, but not a "lockdown") don't work because people don't take them seriously, more restrictive measures will be implemented. What they will be or how they will be enforced is an open question.
Italy ignored the problem until it got out of control, and have had to resort to draconian measures. You can't leave your home except for necessities like food, medicine, etc. Spain, Lithuania, France, Poland and Norway have implemented similar measures, but not as restrictive.
We can avoid more restrictive measures, if we take the current ones seriously. Doing so will save lives. I explain the numbers here:
https://thedonald.win/p/4KFjkIR/x/c/Gbometq1
We are not Europe. We value liberty here. We may save some lives but at what cost?
No, we aren't. But, don't think that more severe restrictions will not be imposed, if local authorities deem it necessary. It shouldn't be country-wide, as there's no reason to apply the same restrictions to a small town in the middle of nowhere vs. NYC. And, there's no reason to impose them where there's no serious outbreak.
It's already done in the aftermath of major disasters like tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc. We can complain, but the precedent is already established.
Aside from the cancellation of large events and classes, current US restrictions for people not knowingly exposed or symptomatic are largely voluntary. We can keep it that way by doing the right things now:
You have the liberty to ignore these guidelines and put others at risk, or do the right thing and maybe help protect the life of someone close to you. As I explain in the post I linked above, not all of them are elderly.
You also have the liberty to prevent this from escalating further, which could make it difficult for more people to go to work and provide for their family.