I'm not defending the US's response at all, but pretty much every country has shut down over this. It's not clear how that could have been prevented. Yes, it would have prevented a lot of deaths, but the total shutdown seems to have been inevitable everywhere.
Look at South Korea and Singapore and Taiwan as examples of countries that applied testing early and haven't needed to tell everyone to shelter in place. They have seen some economic disruption, but nothing like the what the US and the EU are experiencing.
