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Reopening Texas Had No Discernible Impact on Covid-19 Cases or Deaths

53 points by Meekro 5y ago

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
panny 5y ago
This is how it is supposed to work. 50 different states, with 50 different policies. The states with the successful policies are copied by those who had failed policies, such as putting covid patients in nursing homes for the elderly instead of an empty hospital ship provided by the federal government. The whole country can benefit. I only wonder why the states with failed polices are reluctant to follow a successful example.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  > I only wonder why the states with failed polices are reluctant to follow a successful example. Because admitting that their policies failed is hard for politicians. So they bloviate about how the policy was actually successful, and try to make it hard to get apples-to-apples data, and otherwise try to hide the fact that they blew it.
  - muttled 5y ago
    It's remarkable how much of politics comes down to "not it!"
- spfzero 5y ago
  I think only one state put COVID patients into nursing homes. A really bad idea, to be sure, and fortunately one that was not copied. Once you’ve made a decision as monumentality wrong, you’re not going to highlight the fact by correcting yourself too quickly.
  - panny 5y ago
    It wasn't just New York. Michigan did that too. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/2020/09/24/man-charged-punching-detroit-nursing-home-patient-found-competent/3521549001/ https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/20... As well as California, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania. https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020/08/28/michigan-not-alone-allowing-nursing-homes-take-covid-19-patients/5647263002/ https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020...
- jfengel 5y ago
  50 states, 50 policies, 50*50 independent variables, zero controls. Even the overwhelming successes and the overwhelming failures give us little information because of all of the confounding factors. The only things we know are the really obvious: staying away from other people helps prevent disease spread, having big gatherings causes problems. If you needed to be taught that, you're not going to believe any of those 50 experiments. You'll always be able to single out something about them that contradicts it and continue to believe what you wanted to believe.
rossdavidh 5y ago
Texan here. A couple things: 1) the mask mandate was no longer there, but nearly everyone was still wearing masks anyway 2) the businesses had basically all reopened well prior to this; the "lockdown" phase had ended late in April 2020 3) the number one reason it had little or no impact is that a lot of people had already had it, and a lot of people had been vaccinated I'm no particular fan of the mask and lockdown policies, because they seemed like the pandemic equivalent of post-9/11 "security theater". But, I don't think you can draw a lot of conclusions from Texas because not much changed after Abbot announced the changes.
- halfmatthalfcat 5y ago
  While the post-9/11 security “theatre” was mostly window dressing, it’s an undeniable fact that the lockdowns and masking has saved many, many lives.
  - barbacoa 5y ago
    Did all that prevent infection or simply spread out the infection propagation from a few weeks to 1.5 years?
    - contriban 5y ago
      You have a point in that this should not have lasted this long if the world was able to lock down completely until 0 cases for 8 weeks. Other than that, what do you think would have happened if life continued unperturbed in early 2020? Do you think we’d be over it already? I don’t think that’s correct, to be polite.
      - barbacoa 5y ago
        It's too late. The genie is out of the bottle. The moment the virus escaped Wuhan there was/is no stopping it. You'll never get a coordinated world wide lockdown sufficient to stop all infection. And being a strain of flu it will likely coevolve with any vaccine we throw at it. Local strains are already showing resistance against various vaccines. There was even a covid-19 breakout amongst the Yankees team even though they were all vaccinated.
songshuu 5y ago
Misleading title. FTA "We find that the Texas reopening had little impact on stay- at-home behavior or on foot traffic at numerous business locations, including restaurants, bars, entertainment venues, retail establishments, business services, personal care services, and grocery stores," Dave et al. write. So despite 'reopening' people stayed home. That is why it had no discernible impact.

53 points by Meekro 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

This is how it is supposed to work. 50 different states, with 50 different policies. The states with the successful policies are copied by those who had failed policies, such as putting covid patients in nursing homes for the elderly instead of an empty hospital ship provided by the federal government. The whole country can benefit. I only wonder why the states with failed polices are reluctant to follow a successful example.

AnimalMuppet 5y ago
> I only wonder why the states with failed polices are reluctant to follow a successful example. Because admitting that their policies failed is hard for politicians. So they bloviate about how the policy was actually successful, and try to make it hard to get apples-to-apples data, and otherwise try to hide the fact that they blew it.
- muttled 5y ago
  It's remarkable how much of politics comes down to "not it!"
spfzero 5y ago
I think only one state put COVID patients into nursing homes. A really bad idea, to be sure, and fortunately one that was not copied. Once you’ve made a decision as monumentality wrong, you’re not going to highlight the fact by correcting yourself too quickly.
- panny 5y ago
  It wasn't just New York. Michigan did that too. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/2020/09/24/man-charged-punching-detroit-nursing-home-patient-found-competent/3521549001/ https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/20... As well as California, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania. https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020/08/28/michigan-not-alone-allowing-nursing-homes-take-covid-19-patients/5647263002/ https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2020...
jfengel 5y ago
50 states, 50 policies, 50*50 independent variables, zero controls. Even the overwhelming successes and the overwhelming failures give us little information because of all of the confounding factors. The only things we know are the really obvious: staying away from other people helps prevent disease spread, having big gatherings causes problems. If you needed to be taught that, you're not going to believe any of those 50 experiments. You'll always be able to single out something about them that contradicts it and continue to believe what you wanted to believe.

rossdavidh 5y ago

Texan here. A couple things: 1) the mask mandate was no longer there, but nearly everyone was still wearing masks anyway 2) the businesses had basically all reopened well prior to this; the "lockdown" phase had ended late in April 2020 3) the number one reason it had little or no impact is that a lot of people had already had it, and a lot of people had been vaccinated I'm no particular fan of the mask and lockdown policies, because they seemed like the pandemic equivalent of post-9/11 "security theater". But, I don't think you can draw a lot of conclusions from Texas because not much changed after Abbot announced the changes.

halfmatthalfcat 5y ago
While the post-9/11 security “theatre” was mostly window dressing, it’s an undeniable fact that the lockdowns and masking has saved many, many lives.
- barbacoa 5y ago
  Did all that prevent infection or simply spread out the infection propagation from a few weeks to 1.5 years?
  - contriban 5y ago
    You have a point in that this should not have lasted this long if the world was able to lock down completely until 0 cases for 8 weeks. Other than that, what do you think would have happened if life continued unperturbed in early 2020? Do you think we’d be over it already? I don’t think that’s correct, to be polite.
    - barbacoa 5y ago
      It's too late. The genie is out of the bottle. The moment the virus escaped Wuhan there was/is no stopping it. You'll never get a coordinated world wide lockdown sufficient to stop all infection. And being a strain of flu it will likely coevolve with any vaccine we throw at it. Local strains are already showing resistance against various vaccines. There was even a covid-19 breakout amongst the Yankees team even though they were all vaccinated.

songshuu 5y ago

Misleading title. FTA "We find that the Texas reopening had little impact on stay- at-home behavior or on foot traffic at numerous business locations, including restaurants, bars, entertainment venues, retail establishments, business services, personal care services, and grocery stores," Dave et al. write. So despite 'reopening' people stayed home. That is why it had no discernible impact.