Don't know why you generally omit Canada, but we're doing so much better as well.
There's an old joke: "How do you get 50 Canadians out of the swiming pool?" Answer: say, "please get out of the pool." (It's funny only because it is generally true.) Canada, unlike the US, wasn't born in revolution, so we don't retain (as Americans seem to) a revolutionary attitude. When we understand the reason for something, we do not see it as a great infringement on our "rights" to be asked to do something that will benefit everybody, and so we just get on with it and do it.
As a consquence, as of this moment, Canada is pretty much open for business again, but people are mostly behaving responsibly (wearing masks, distancing, hand-washing), and we are dying at a rate of about one fifteenth (per capita) of the US.
But you are correct -- in general, the medical profession is getting it right. For sure we didn't understand this virus at well in the early days, and there's still much to be learned, but one thing that now appears to be pretty much certain: Social distancing, mask-wearing indoors and when distancing isn't possible, and strong hand-hygiene, will do just about as much good as a total shut down. And that's something that should be considered, because that means that you can mostly keep your economy going by doing some pretty simple stuff. AND, it will also make for a less severe flu season, as an added bonus!