US Cases: 13,921,312*
US Deaths: 267,228*
Worldwide Cases: 65,111,866*
Worldwide Deaths: 1,504,303*
* - Numbers are a lower bound. True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration
As a Minnesotan, I would like to ask South Dakota and Iowa to knock it off. ProPublica has a story about how certain states are effectively peeing in the swimming pool, and making things worse for those of us trying to do the responsible thing.
Nowhere are these regulatory disparities more counterproductive and jarring than in the border areas between restrictive and permissive states; for example, between Washington and Idaho, Minnesota and South Dakota, and Illinois and Iowa. In each pairing, one state has imposed tough and sometimes unpopular restrictions on behavior, only to be confounded by a neighbor’s leniency. Like factories whose emissions boost asthma rates for miles around, a state’s lax public health policies can wreak damage beyond its borders.“In some ways, the whole country is essentially living with the strategy of the least effective states because states interconnect and one state not doing a good job will continue to spread the virus to other states,” said Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health. “States can’t wall themselves off.”A motorcycle rally in August in Sturgis, South Dakota, with half a million attendees from around the country spread COVID-19 to neighboring Minnesota and beyond, according to Melanie Firestone, an epidemic intelligence service officer for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who co-authored a report on the event’s impact.South Dakota “didn’t have policies regarding mask use or event size, and we see that there was an impact in a state that did have such policies,” Firestone said. “The findings from this outbreak support having consistent approaches across states. We are all in it together when it comes to stopping the spread of COVID-19.”
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem seems to be doing all she can to win the title of worst response to the #TrumpVirus. She has resisted putting common-sense policies in place, even as her own grandmother's nursing home is ravaged by the virus. We can't know whether Noem is motivated by her hatred of science or her love of Trump, but we do know that apparently her grandmother means less to her than either of those things.
UPDATE: And also ---
BREAKING: In just 24 hours, the U.S. has broken every record set since the pandemic began 10 months ago, with more new infections, hospitalizations and deaths in a single day than ever before.@NorahODonnell has the latest pic.twitter.com/B2eH28nGrS
— CBS Evening News (@CBSEveningNews) December 3, 2020
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