If "we" is America, we were prepared for an epidemic, but sadly we were governed at the time by a bunch of drooling knuckle draggers and criminals who ignored the preparations and actually worked against the medical experts to spread disease. Most countries in the world did very much better against COVID because they were prepared and motivated and governed by normal governments

We actually were but all of the plans were shelved because of muh freedums. The virus gave us 90 days to get our act together and get out ahead of it. We failed.