Correcting the Lies on Lockdowns and Restrictions Affecting Covid Mortality
Gavin Newsom is 100% Wrong that His State did 35% Better than Florida
On Tuesday, California Governor Gavin Newsom held his State of the State address for 2022, this occurring almost exactly two years since he first shut down his state over the Covid-19 pandemic.
In his speech Newsom mentioned other large states which had a greater Covid death rate than California, but he singled out Florida by stating California had:
"Fewer (Covid deaths) than Florida - 35 percent, to be exact."
This isn't the brag he wants us all to think it is. The highest risk factor for Covid is age. 85% of all Covid associated deaths are in those over 60, a group representing just one-fifth of the population. Half of all Covid deaths are in those over 75, a quarter in those over 85. Without adjusting for population age when comparing a state's Covid death rate the numbers have much less meaning.
California has about double the population of Florida, 39 versus 22 million. Yet California has only about 1.5 million more senior citizens, 6 million in California versus about 4.5 million in Florida. So as a percent of the population, senior citizens make up about 15% of Californians, but over 21% of Floridians. Florida's rate is higher, over 35% higher... You can see where this is going...
By age-adjusted Covid associated deaths California is nearly indistinguishable from Florida. California has 256 deaths per 100K, Florida 265, just a 3.5 percent difference. (Not exactly 35% Gavin...)
You can extend this comparison beyond California and Florida to the US as a whole. While there is quite a bit of divergence in Covid death rates there is essentially no correlation with lockdowns and other Covid restrictions.
By plotting each state's Age Adjusted Covid death rate against each state's average level of stringency throughout the pandemic (Using the Oxford Covid Stringency Index) we get the following scatter plot:
Almost a complete scatter shot, though there is a subtle trend favoring restrictions with an R-squared of 0.14. But if you exclude Hawaii and Alaska from the sample, since there situations were quite different than the rest of the US, and look at just the Contiguous US, you get this:
It’s completely random noise with an R-squared of 0.06, implying just 6% of a state's variance from the mean in Covid mortality can potentially be attributed to lockdowns and other restrictions. Even that 6% is likely just a coincidence caused by confounding variables, such as state with restrictions tending to have people taking more voluntary precautions, and just being on average wealthier and healthier.
Compare this against other contributors to Covid deaths. After age, the next highest risk factors are comorbidities like obesity. Look at how a graph of Age-Adjusted Covid mortality compares to a graph of state average obesity rates:
First Covid deaths:
Then Obesity:
I'm seeing a pattern...
When you plot the relationship you get a graph like this:
Unlike the Stringency Index graph above, this graph has an immediately visible trend, and the R-squared is 0.31, over 5 times greater than the Stringency Index.
This implies that just knowing a State's obesity rate is 5 times more predictive of a State's Age-Adjusted Covid Mortality than knowing what restrictions a State took to "fight" the pandemic.
It was all about age and health, everything else was just the Illusion of Control! When the media and blue state politicians point to other areas of the country and blame them for having higher Covid mortality, (to the very minor extent to which this is true) they're really just blaming them for being older, poorer, and less healthy, which is really just cruel.
Look again at the California-Florida comparison. Newsom has to try to call out Florida, because it was such a stark contrast. California epitomized Covid Tyranny, while Florida represented Openness and Freedom. Newsom needs the public to believe those policy decisions accomplished something, because those policies came at such a cost, but the opposite is the truth. The Governor himself admitted in the speech that the lockdown were “distressing”, and that’s an understatement.
California had a lockdown that never fully lifted until late Spring 2021. Florida never fully locked down and had a complete reopening in September 2020.
California forced sports teams to relocate out of state and moved the Rose Bowl to Texas. Florida hosted sporting events with fans in the stands and hosted a packed Super Bowl.
California had a mask mandate in some form for nearly two years, and it still applies to school children to this day. Florida never had a state mask mandate, and restricted localities from implementing local mandates.
Californian children suffered a year of Zoom "school" followed by a year of school in a mask. In Florida every school was open for the entire 2020 school year, and every school was mask free by law in 2021.
Governor Newsom had the full endorsement and financial backing from the teachers unions during his recall election. Governor DeSantis was sued by the teachers unions, unsuccessfully, to try and keep the schools closed.
California shutdown businesses and restaurants for over a year, they outlawed outdoor dining in Los Angeles during the winter! Florida placed zero restrictions on businesses from September 2020 onward and outlawed restrictions from local governments.
On St. Patrick's Day in 2021, bar owners in California had to break the law to open, and had their power and utilities shut off. In Florida all the bars were open and the Governor was out promoting them.
California instituted vaccine mandates, and fired healthcare and public safety workers who didn't comply. Venues in California still require proof of MRNA compliance to enter. In Florida government vaccine mandates were outlawed, and private vaccine mandates were curtailed by requiring religious and personal belief exemptions.
California still plans to impose a Covid vaccine mandate to attend school starting next Fall. Florida recently advised against healthy children taking the Covid vaccine.
California has a "S.M.A.R.T.E.R." plan to continue the "War on Covid" indefinitely. Florida just held a roundtable discussion on "The Curtain Close on Covid Theater".
Among large states in the U.S. you cannot find a more stark contrast on Covid policy between California and Florida, and yet they ended up in the Exact Same Place. I hope enough of the country understands this truth and votes accordingly.
Anyway, 0 and 2...
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You should send your data to the news!
At the county level, I found that % of Smokers seems to be the best single predictor of deaths... my guess is this is a proxy for general health of population & age. https://inumero.substack.com/p/best-predictor-of-covid-deaths-in?r=tv61s&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web