200,000 COVID deaths: TIME cover spotlights "devastating milestone"

TIME editor-in-chief and CEO Edward Felsenthal: "For this week’s U.S. cover, we turned to artist John Mavroudis, who — using data from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center — hand-wrote the death counts in America on every one of the 193 days between Feb. 29, the first confirmation of a COVID-related death in the U.S., and Sept. 8, as it neared time to go to press."

• "Out of that data, the illustration reveals the coming grim milestone of 200,000." (Latest U.S. death count: 190,872.)
• "Creative director D.W. Pine then placed the illustration within a black border — only the second time in our history we have done so, the first being after 9/11."

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