Landing at Palm Beach International Airport, I was ready to see how the other half lived. That is the healthy half of COVID.
Our family had not left New York in March. I read about how Florida managed to maintain a similar or lower case rate than New York, avoiding our crippling blockages. However, we were afraid. “Be careful there, no one is wearing a mask,” was typical of the advice I received from well-meaning friends.
And indeed, Florida has a reputation as one of the weakest states. In mid-April, after a brief blockade, Governor Ron DeSantis gave the green light to the beaches. “Wait two weeks!” nayaysers urged then. But two weeks came and went, and Florida’s number remained relatively constant after a peak in mid-July.
Getting off the plane, I noticed something strange: they were all, in fact, masked. And keeping his distance. There was a hand sanitizer everywhere. The COVID “Mad Max” world was nowhere to be found. Yes, everything was open, but in terms of precautions, South Florida looked a lot like New York.
The main difference: masks are not worn in risk-free situations. In Gotham, it is very common to see masked people even alone on empty streets. Young children wear masks outside. In Florida, I saw children without masks playing outside together. It looked like it used to.
Which is a good thing: we act like it’s no big deal to wear masks even when the risk is non-existent. But, of course, it matters. In Florida, I saw the smiling faces of strangers for the first time in nine months. It is hard to overstate how much this mattered to our well-being and sense of normalcy. There is also the element of pandemic fatigue: Wearing a mask all the time, even when it is not necessary, will at some point discourage use when it actually matters.
However, it is a lie that Floridians do not take the new coronavirus seriously. What they have done is to eliminate policies that do not work, while keeping those that do work.
Governor Cuomo, on the day he closed the indoor restaurant in New York, mentioned that the spread of COVID in restaurants accounted for 1.4% of cases. In Florida, they have decided that such numbers mean that the restaurant inside remains open. In New York, I didn’t do it stupidly.
In Florida, DeSantis has given priority to school openings. In New York, Cuomo swelled his chest and said he was in charge of schools, but then washed his hands when it came time to make the effort to open them.
And Florida’s policies have paid off. On January 9, New York reported 17,839 new cases. Florida, with about 2 million more people than New York, had 15,445. An open state, such as Florida, which has fewer COVID cases than a closed majority state, such as New York, demonstrates that prolonged blockades are a failure.
And this disparity led people like Cuomo’s senior adviser Rich Azzopardi to spin bizarre conspiracy theories on Twitter that Florida “cooked the book with the numbers of cases.” It is much harder to admit that his boss destroyed restaurants and other businesses for no reason.
Even if Florida somehow hides numbers, bodies are harder to hide. Florida had 22,000 deaths from COVID-19 and 38,000 from New York. The virus hit both states at the same time.
Even the weather can’t explain the difference. Yes, floridians are often outdoors due to the calm climates of the Sunshine State. But that doesn’t explain why the virus is getting out of hand in tightly closed California.
Florida shows then that moderation is actually the key to the fight against COVID-19. A New Yorker in Florida constantly asks, “Why doesn’t my own state government trust me as much as the government here trusts its people?”
The New York authorities do not trust our people to do what is right for them and their neighbors. Our lives are held hostage to Cuomo’s whims. Floridians know what to expect and largely normalize their lives.
They are healthy. We do not.
Twitter: @Karol