Floridians Stopped Traveling Well Before Official Shutdowns, Data Shows

[JI7]

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a stay-at-home order that went into effect April 3. By comparison, California's stay-at-home order began March 19, Illinois' started March 21, New York's on March 22 and Ohio's on March 23.

Despite Florida's later action, the data showed that people sharply cut their travel well before their counties and the state issued stay-at-home orders.

For example, in the five days before Miami-Dade County's March 26 stay-at-home order, more than half the phones tracked by Descartes Labs never traveled more than a mile, according to the Times. That was a drop of more than 80% compared with data collected from mid-February to early March.

The analysis confirms what experts told CNN earlier this month as DeSantis took credit for the comparatively low infection and death rate in Florida.

Florida, the country's third-most populous state, has had over 40,000 confirmed coronavirus cases and over 1,700 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Its infection rate and death rate per capita have been well below those of other states, and experts are torn as to why that is.

Florida remains an enigma, according to multiple epidemiologists who spoke to CNN -- a place where unique factors like "car culture," lower density in parts of the state outside of Miami, less frequent use of public transportation and possibly even heat and humidity may have slowed transmission of the coronavirus.

Still, they worry that the Sunshine State will see a second wave of coronavirus cases as restaurants and many businesses open their doors.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/11/us/florida-coronavirus-travel/index.html

[DallasNE]

1. They Missed One Obvious Reason

Florida has a high number of retirees living there and they hunkered down early in the process. If heat and humidity were a strong factor then why has New Orleans been hit so hard. Or Houston.

[sarcasmo]

7. Mardi Gras is the reason for New Orleans being hit hard.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/coronavirus-new-orleans-mardi-gras/2020/03/26/8c8e23c8-6fbb-11ea-b148-e4ce3fbd85b5_story.html

[DallasNE]

8. So Why Didn't Orlando Get Hit Hard Then

would most likely have been travelers from Europe and they would have been flocking to both places. Orlando and New Orleans have similar weather that time of year, I would think. The other thing that bothers me on the timing is that the first case didn't show up until 13 days after Marti Gras ended. But this veers away from my point about something beside heat to explain why south Florida as been spared. So was Orlando, with Disney World going full blast, but New Orleans wasn't. Old people hunkering down has been a difference maker.

[Roland99]

9. Theme parks closed March 15. And most were out of staters

[DallasNE]

11. And They Weren't At Marti Gras?

Including people from Europe that were spreading the virus.

Plus, Marti Gras ended 13 days before the first reported case in New Orleans. One would have expected the first case to occur roughly 1 week earlier than it did. But post Marti Graw the French Quarter is still a popular tourist attraction so it likely did start in the French Quarter but not necessarily during Marti Gras. Orlando has similar weather to New Orleans, is a popular tourist attraction so it looks more like luck of the draw rather than weather that was responsible for the vastly different outcome.

[Roland99]

12. There may have been a few at Mardi Gras but that's a 10hr drive

And doesn’t have anything to do with Orlando theme parks shutting down 3 weeks before DeSantis’ order

Several counties had already issued Stay At Home before the statewide order was finally issued

[babylonsister]

2. Maybe the older population

took it more seriously. We have been and will continue to hunker down for the time being. Definitely a car culture where I live and there is very limited public transportation-buses. Makes sense.

[jimfields33]

3. Definitely no public transportation

We don’t even have a city bus available. I should say town. City in actuality is not what we are.

[Chainfire]

4. My area of Florida has no public transportation

because we are so rural that we have no place to go.

One thing that I have not seen considered is that, because of Floridians advanced average age, perhaps there is also more wisdom. When you become old enough to come to terms with your own mortality, as a fact rather than a theory, you tend to be more cautious.

[Igel]

5. These are unique?

Florida remains an enigma, according to multiple epidemiologists who spoke to CNN -- a place where unique factors like "car culture," lower density in parts of the state outside of Miami, less frequent use of public transportation and possibly even heat and humidity may have slowed transmission of the coronavirus.

Sounds like the epidemiologists have stop thinking that the rest of the world is like a few US states.


However, there are two stories that are likely linked in an unpleasant way.

One is a gotcha story: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142468711 and later incarnations of the same idea. https://www.democraticunderground.com/100213289115 It turns out we did lock down earlier than we locked down.

The second is a non-story because nobody wants to report on it in a positive way--it's who we are, apparently. All the models called for a much higher death toll, with a very good chance of exceeding capacity in the US by a wide margin. That didn't happen. IMHE was routinely panned for lowering its predictions, but it's because it was predicting, day by day, death tolls dozens to hundreds higher than what was reported. And when you're trying to model data and you're overpredicting, it's a bad thing. Even taking into account overlooked/off-book deaths because they're misclassified doesn't help, the numbers aren't there.

But the models assumed lockdowns happened when announced. Not a week or two earlier. So that locking down earlier *did* save lives. Except in the areas that were leading the way--the stage was already set. Had Trump pushed mitigation a week or two earlier he would have done it about the same time the actual informal locking down happened.

The unpleasantness is that if the population hadn't done the informal self-locking-down it would have been much worse.

It also requires a bit of a rewrite of the narrative. Trump's irresponsibility wasn't a big deal. And the awesomeness of the lockdown orders and the hundreds of lives saved by governors who made the orders--not bad governors in "those" states--suddenly evaporates. The bad governors didn't need to do anything, and the good governors were late to the game.

[MiniMe]

6. Maybe old farts don't take their phone with them everywhere

[Cha]

10. KR.. my sister, her family, and my nephew & his

girlfriend live in Gainesville and St Pete. Two more liberal cities.