In Defense of Fl

That Marion county sheriff just became another version of Florida Man.

He's up for re-election, and I suspect it's at least partially a political move.

I wonder if he has any real opposition in the election?

Mike Chitwood, our sheriff here in Volusia county, just recovered from covid-19. I appreciate him even more after seeing this. 

Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) said:

That Marion county sheriff just became another version of Florida Man.

He's up for re-election, and I suspect it's at least partially a political move.

I wonder if he has any real opposition in the election?

Mike Chitwood, our sheriff here in Volusia county, just recovered from covid-19. I appreciate him even more after seeing this. 

Ho. Lee. Cow. 

I just read two articles on him (Marion County Sheriff). Wow. 

MrJoshua said:

aircooled said:

One of the reasons why the Fl R rate is lowish is because it was such a S-show recently (now decreasing, thus the R rate).

 

You peaked my curiosity with this one. So looking at the R numbers from the same site: Florida was in the midst of their "S-show" 2 months ago with a R rate of 1.21. 40 of the 50 states were in a positive growth phase at that time and there were 8 states the same or worse than FL.  Fast forward to today and we are now at an R of 0.96. 33 states have a worse rate than us and 20 are still in positive growth. 

To expand on this a bit:  The R rate (for those that are not clear on it) reflects the rate of change, and is very much a measure of the "flatten the curve" idea (below 1 flattening, above one expanding).  As noted above, this is a very much influenced by recent trends that may not reflect an overall trend (e.g. large public gatherings, a surge or dip in testing).  I thought of what I think is a decent analogy for it:

You are driving a car down a road at 30mph, holding your foot on the gas so that you maintain that speed, running a tire over those drunk bumps.  Each one of those bumps is a new case.  At this steady state, you are at R 1.0, still new cases, just not at an increasing rate.  If you let of the gas a bit, you will start to slow down, and the rate (speed) you run over the bumps slows, this is an R below 1.0.  More gas, more speed, higher R.  (this is where it get unrealistic to a car)  If you keep your foot slightly off the gas, the car will eventually come to a stop (no new cases).  The more off the gas the faster it happens.

As always noted, much of this data is very poor for a realistic overview, but decent for comparison.  One aspect that is "missing" and / or generally not considered is that these number represent historical total cases, NOT current circulating cases.  So, generally, anyone who had it more that a few week ago, drop off the current case stat (which does not exist)

Even in heavily affected areas, the percentage of those affected are realistically very low.  Looking at Los Angeles for example, the total numbers represent about 2% of the population (214k out of 10 mill) and those are historical numbers, not current cases.  Of note of course (crap data) is that the infected number are certainly way undercounted (maybe as high as 1/10).  Again though, those include historical numbers.  This is not to say there is nothing to worry about.  Go to some large gatherings / parties and your percentage will certainly jump wildly.  Take precautions, your percentage will drop to very very low.

Grizz said:

How many of floridas cases are because of snowbirds fleeing new york I wonder?

In August? 

frenchyd said:

Grizz said:

How many of floridas cases are because of snowbirds fleeing new york I wonder?

In August? 

I assume he's talking about people that left NY during and immediately after the thick of their peak to get out of the dense city, not people looking to escape winter for warmer weather. People that looked around and thought, "why are we staying here, and going through all of this, when we could just go down to our place in FL?" I have no idea if this happened, or to what extent, but those people could've unknowingly brought the virus with them to FL if that occurred, which would've lead to an increase in cases. Similar thing occurred with the Spring Break crowds, but FL has some responsibility for those since they opened the beaches.

In reply to STM317 :

Way back when this started, New Yorkers were largely responsible for spreading the virus all over the country.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/us/new-york-city-coronavirus-outbreak.html

I defend florida by attacking new york as I live on the i95 corridor and attacking new york plates is second nature.