Coronavirus will hit the health system hard, and not all states are prepared

WASHINGTON - As coronavirus infections spread across the country, the outbreak will test America's unusually decentralized public health system, spotlighting large gaps in some states' readiness to confront a major health crisis.

That threatens to exacerbate an outbreak that has already infected more than 1,000 Americans, but is expected to grow dramatically in coming weeks and put severe strains on medical providers around the country.

Nationwide, spending on public health varies dramatically between those states and local governments that have invested and others that have allowed public health departments to wither in recent years.

In Florida, for example, where a large population of seniors makes the state particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus,