Governor Kristi Noem thinks she deserves a parade for sitting in Pierre and taking no strict government action to combat coronavirus. Instead she deserves the ignominy of the unnecessary deaths of dozens of South Dakotans on her shoulders.
Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government calculates a stringency index to measure how extensively governments are responding to the covid-19 pandemic. They distill eight containment and closure policies, four economic policies, and five health system policies* into a 0-to-100 scale. Oxford provides this cool slider map that allows us to see at a glance how seriously each nation was taking coronavirus on each day since January 21:
The United States shot from 5.56 on March 1 to 72.69 on March 21. As a nation, we remain at that level; the stringency index doesn’t measure state-level responses. The U.S. is at the same stringency index as Mexico, a tick above Canada (70.83), way ahead of Nicaragua (11.11), but behind Panama (89.81) and Cuba (100.00).
The stringency index is like measuring how many firefighters we send to a fire. The sooner we send those firefighters, the sooner we contain the fire, and the more stuff we can save from burning up.
A father-son Harvard team look compare stringency indices from the U.S., Singapore, South Korea, Germany, and Australia and find that if we had done like those four countries and sent in lots of firefighters when we first smelled smoke instead of waiting for the whole block to catch fire, we’d have saved tens of thousands of lives:
The Oxford index shows that 14 days from the date of the 15th confirmed case in each country — a vital early window for action — the U.S. response to the outbreak lagged behind the others by miles. The U.S. stringency score of 5.7 at that point was 25% of Australia’s (23), 23% of Germany’s (25), 18% of Singapore’s (32), and only 15% of South Korea’s (38).
Due to exponential viral spread, our delay in action was devastating. In the wake of the U.S. response, 117,858 Americans died in the four months following the first 15 confirmed cases. After an equivalent period, Germany suffered only 8,863 casualties. Scaling up the German population of 83.7 million to America’s 331 million, a U.S.-sized Germany would have suffered 35,049 Covid-19 deaths. So if the U.S. had acted as effectively as Germany, 70% of U.S. coronavirus deaths might have been prevented.
Seventy percent, though, is the most conservative estimate. Scaled-up versions of South Korea, Australia, and Singapore would have experienced 1,758, 1,324, and 1,358 deaths, respectively, in the four months after 15 cases were confirmed in each country. Had we handled the coronavirus as effectively as any of these three countries, roughly 99% of the 117,858 U.S. Covid-19 deaths might have been averted [Isaac Sebenius and James K. Sebenius, “How Many Needless Covid-19 Deaths Were Caused by Delays in Responding? Most of Them,” Statnews.com, 2020.06.19].
Things could have been worse here in America. Our responses, delayed as they were, still prevented millions of coraonvirus cases
But if we apply the relatively conservative urgency of Germany’s response and the 70% saved rate to South Dakota, well, with 81 South Dakotans dead so far from coronavirus, a swifter response following the lead of the Germans from whom many of us descended could have saved 56 lives.
56 South Dakotans not dead if Kristi Noem had spent less time primping in her vanity video studio and trying to shut down serious government responses to the pandemic and more time using the power of her office to save South Dakotans’ lives.
*Oxford’s stringency scale includes these policies:
- school closings
- workplace closings
- cancellation of publci events
- restrictions on gatherings
- public transport closings
- stay-at-home requirements
- restrictions on internal movement
- international travel controls
- income support
- debt/contract relief
- fiscal measures
- international support
- public information campaigns
- testing policy
- contract tracing
- emergency investment in healthcare
- investment in vaccines
Here is the latest covid counts from NW iowa….
Des Moines, IA (KICD)– The total number of COVID-19 cases in the local area continue to climb one day after Iowa hit 25,000 total cases of the virus.
As of 11 a.m. Saturday, the state sits at 25,424 total cases and 681 total deaths. The update includes 1,640 total cases in Buena Vista County, 192 in Dickinson County, 102 cases in Clay County, 70 in O’Brien, 65 in Cherokee County, 49 reports in Osceola County, 48 in Emmet, 36 in Pocahontas County, 22 in Kossuth and 20 in Palo Alto County.
Guess which county has an operating pork slaughter plant. drumpf’s body count reached another milestone late last night/early this morning….
Deaths:
122,069
GNOem should be charged with manslaughter for her irresponsibility in looking for the welfare of South Dakota citizens in causing their deaths. GNOem has blood on her hands and no matter how much she washes, the taint will never leave.
On March 10 the Summit League had their Women’s Basketball Championship game with 8,000 screaming fans at the Event Center. The same day (SAME DAY!), March 10, 2020 our first cases of the virus were announced. Why did the people who knew there were cases in Sioux Falls let that game happen? How many people attending that game got sick? How many died?
Mr. Barth, it’s all about the benjamin’s. We die to fill the cash registers with bills not coins (there is a shortage nationally of coins, how about that?). The rest of the world doesn’t want us to even consider visiting them as we are so contaminated. They don’t even want our chickens.
72 more cases with 11 in Pennington County today. GNOem’s winning!
The walk of shame, let’s work to see that GNOem also has the look at the end of her first and only term for the same reason, unnecessary deaths at their blood stained hands. https://twitter.com/pat_lee/status/1274602646746300416 Check out this bozo, man it looks like someone took his lunch money. I watched this a couple of times and laughed harder each time.
Mother Jones has a great read on the pandemic in America’s packing plants and the mish mash of regulations of who can order plants to close and who is supposed to protect workers, etc. There were plans in place to protect the plants and nation’s food supply, but no plans to protect workers.
https://www.motherjones.com/food/2020/06/covid-meatpacking-emails/
Thinking of flying from South Dakota? Good luck on coming and going. Wait until we finish this first wave and then get into the second wave.
“An independent federal watchdog has ordered an investigation into the Transportation Security Administration’s response to the coronavirus, after a whistleblower alleged that the agency botched its initial handling of the pandemic when millions of people continued to fly each day, and that it is still doing too little to protect travelers and its own employees.
The whistleblower, Jay Brainard, the top TSA manager in Kansas, filed his complaint with the Office of Special Counsel, saying the agency’s failures amounted to “gross mismanagement.” Washington Post 6.18.2020
GNOem and the rest of the sycophants have never taken this virus serious. They have said we live in a remote place so no worries. She could have done something to take care of her constituents, but that would be been inconvenient and would’ve gotten in the way of her photo shoots from the basement.
Mr. Barth, did not you know we had an extreme likelihood of the virus here in South Dakota? Do you YOU bear more blame than most? Did you stay home? Are you still barricaded in place? If not, you should consider it…do not be huffing downhill at the Great Bear Hill panting and flinging spittle all about as you huff, marching downhill.
Back in the sauce eh Mr. grudznick? That hooch will make your spittle go farther than normal, so please talk to yourself while wearing your mask and be considerate of others…just sayin.
Indeed, Mr. jerry. Pour me another, minion.
trump/GNOem, Slow the testing down, or stop the testing…
“”You know testing is a double-edged sword,” Trump said while complaining about press coverage of his handling of the virus. Claiming the US has now tested some 25 million people, he added: “Here’s the bad part … when you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people; you’re going to find more cases. So I said to my people, slow the testing down please.”
It was a stunning revelation given that nearly 120,000 people have died in the United States from the coronavirus and medical experts have long said that testing is critical to identifying cases, tracing them and stopping the spread of the virus.
[…]
But acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf said the President’s comments reflected his “frustration” with the relentless focus on the increasing Covid-19 case count in America.
http://www.cnn.com — June 21, 2020″https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/6/21/1954949/–So-I-said-to-my-people-SLOW-the-testing-DOWN-please?utm_campaign=recent
People, a penny is worth more than a person’s life. We are the collateral damage to a madman and his party’s war against America. 122,000 dead Americans from republican mismanagement and we ain’t even in the middle of the first wave.
Jerry, Blubbering Baby is frustrated with the “relentless focus on the increasing Covid-19 case count in America”? Yeah. Hundreds of thousands of deaths does tend to sharpen the focus.
I watched the walk from Marine one also. Beautiful.
Kruel Kristi could have saved 56 lives. I’d personally throw her 10 parades if she’d done that. Her nickname is not too harsh.
Please show me where all of you bashed governors in Blue States regarding all of their deaths please. Especially New York. Michigan. California. How many are in those? Asking for a friend.
Governors in blue states did all they could to slow down the spread of covid and thus prevent higher death totals. That shows the citizens their pols care about them more than greedy money changers.
It was almost a certainty that the most populous states would have higher pandemic rates and death rates, but they could have been much worse without decisive actions.
Look at what is going o in Texas with a right wing nut job in charge.
Twitter had drumpf’s walk of shame showing with Hurt by Johnny Cash as background music. Perfect, but I don’t think it is any longer available.
It appears Steve has missed the point. It matters not whether a state is blue or red. What matters is understanding the objective evidence indicating that “pandemic rates and death rates” would “have been much worse without decisive actions,” by the state’s governor, just as mfi said.
Cory’s story give no political or other opinions one way or another about whether Noem’s limited response increased deaths in SD. Rather, Cory simply applies objective evidence to our own State from “Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government,” which calculated “a stringency index to measure how extensively governments are responding to the covid-19 pandemic.” Whether one supports or opposes Noem, the fact appears to be that applying Oxford’s analytical model to SD shows an increase in SD deaths due to our state government limited response.
One can certainly dispute whether this evidence is valid or not, but focusing instead on whether one measures a blue or red state simply reveals the commenter’s political bias, rather than any meaningful information. And since Cory writes primarily about South Dakota, his focus on SD, rather than other states, certainly is not surprising.
Perhaps Steve can use Oxford’s objective data to analyze the effects of governors’ responses in the blue states he is concerned about and share that information with DFP?
Texas nutjob guv, Greg A-Butt says spike in covid cases is unacceptable, proposes voluntary social distancing and says shutting down the state is THE last option to save lives.
Defenders at the Alamo should have been this resolute.
Isn’t that the “plan” he’s been using? I mean, doing nothing as Texans die?
Thank you, Bearcreekbat, for bringing your usual reading comprehension and grasp of the real point to the conversation. Indeed, while Steve tries to cry about whatever political point occupies his attention, I’m looking at data. Oxford provides data showing that countries that took the pandemic threat seriously sooner saved lots of lives.
I would welcome a study that applies Oxford’s stringency index state by state to determine how quickly each state acted, who early each state pulled back from pandemic response, and how their death rates correlate to those actions.
Mayors in Texas have to get A-Butt’s blessing to shut anything down.