COVID-19: “Flattening the Curve:” Has Florida Repeated Philadelphia’s Mistake During the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic?
The Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis faces criticisms for allowing young college students on spring break to party on Florida beaches while people flee from the new Covid-19 epicenter in the Northeast to the state. He finally issued a state-wide stay-at-home order on April 1 but excluded churches. South Korea’s first Covid-19 case of community spread (Patient #31) was traced to the Shincheonji church which ultimately became responsible for spreading the epidemic in the country. Nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) including social containment measures like banning large gatherings, are effective in reducing infectious contacts between persons. Studies from the response of different cities during the 1918 Flu pandemic show that early implementations of multiple NPIs within a few days after the first local cases were recorded decreased peak death rates by up to 50%, with comparatively less-steep epidemic curves. Philadelphia made a disastrous decision when it allowed a parade of 200,000 people just 10 days after the city’s first reported case of the flu. Three days after that parade, there were 20,000 infected. St. Louis on the other hand had responded early, banning gatherings and quarantined patients in their homes after its first reported case. In the deadly first six months of the pandemic, 385 people per 100,000 died in St. Louis compared to 807 per 100,000 in Philadelphia. Covid-19 disproportionately infects older people aged 60 and up, a group that makes up 28% of Florida’s population. Florida’s first case was March 1. Today, there are 11,545 confirmed cases and 195 deaths.
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