By: John C. Lesher
This is my fourth blog since early March concerning the coronavirus plague. I don’t regard these missives as a journal, or chronology or a diary: just a series of thoughts based on day-to-day observations of fellow Americans coping with the economic and societal consequences of “social distancing.” A read of Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year would be a good start for all of us trying to understand the fully realized consequences of an all-out pandemic (in Defoe’s case, London in 1665). Thankfully, Defoe’s Journal is not America’s reality.
But, what is our reality? In addition to the illness tolls we read about every day, dramatic economic failures are the inescapable norm at the moment. As this is being written, over 26 million new unemployment claims have been filed; airline runways are, as usual, filled with planes, but these planes are parked, not awaiting takeoff; my wife and I had planned a 50th anniversary cruise followed by a 5 week rental in Paris—good luck with that; construction is less than half of what it was two months ago. Ok I’ll stop—you know the drill.
Two things are obviously needed to get us out of this horrible rut. The first is a safe, effective and widely utilized vaccine; the second is a restart of the stalled economy. I know far more about business than medicine, so I’ll stick to my knitting and present a few thoughts on economic matters.
Governors and health experts are filling the airwaves with constant references to the necessity of widespread testing as a first step to re-opening America for business. The cogent reason given is that we need a reliable statistical profile of this disease in order to evaluate when and where conditions are sufficiently safe to restart economic activity. I agree with that assessment. My only quibble is that I believe the required profile already exists, or at least is well underway to compilation, and I hope our statistical experts look at data hiding in plain sight.
A front page New York Times article on April 24th, is a starting point. The article is headlined “Coronavirus Death Rates: How the States Compare,” and jumps to charts on P. A11 that tell an intriguing tale. The charts measure death rates per 100,000 residents of each state. Some of the death rates are heartbreaking—New York at 79, New Jersey at 57, Connecticut at 43 and Massachusetts at 32 lead the nation, along with Louisiana, which matches Massachusetts at 32. In terms of human life, a state like New York, with 20 million residents, had 16,000 deaths at its rate of 79 deaths per 100,000; New Jersey with 8 million residents and a 57 rate per 100,000 has experienced 4,700 deaths.
The “BosWash” corridor from the nation’s capital to Boston has experienced in excess of half the cases and deaths from coronavirus in the United States. Approximately one or two percent of our land mass has experienced more than 50% of the morbidity and mortality of this pandemic. This is presumably in large measure because BosWash is America’s most densely populated area, centering on New York City. Whatever the reason for this concentration of coronavirus infection in the Northeast, the fact is that its distribution throughout the 50 states is very uneven.
A further look at the charts published by the Times tells a more hopeful story. Particularly notable is the experience of 13 of our states. Seven of them (Alaska, Arkansas, Hawaii, Montana, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming) have experienced one death per 100,000 residents. This translates in Montana, with one million residents, to only 10 deaths from coronavirus. It is notable that the governors of Arkansas, Utah and Wyoming have not issued stay-at-home orders, although they have strongly encouraged social distancing, closed schools and banned mass gatherings. An additional six states (Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Texas and West Virginia) have slightly higher death rates at two per 100,000 residents. Nebraska and North Dakota do not have stay-at-home orders, but also have restricted gatherings, closed schools, etc.
Eight of the states where low death totals per capita are concentrated are low-population jurisdictions, but Hawaii, North Carolina and Texas don’t fit that mold. Hawaii’s head count is 1.45 million, but 2/3 of that number is on one island, Oahu, which has a density of 1,600 residents per square mile. That density is exceeded only by America’s largest metropolitan areas; North Carolina’s population is nearly 11 million (ninth most residents in the nation) and Texas is our second most populated state with 25-30 million.
I’ll leave it to social scientists and medical professionals to devise theories explaining why these 13 states have suffered such limited harm from the coronavirus. I’ll look only at the death rate and pose a challenging question. Should these 13 states resume business activity, at least on a tentative and carefully controlled basis? Is a bakery in Missoula a danger to society? A Burger King in Wheeling a public menace? At some point in the near future we will have to assume the risk of resumed business activity and social interaction. Why not start—cautiously!!- in states with very limited adverse effects from the corona virus?
The BosWash corridor obviously needs close monitoring that will continue until those areas have infection and death rates greatly reduced from present statistics. However, a national one-size-fits-all lockdown approach to control the spread of this virus might be an unwarranted cure worse than the disease. Equating New York City and Wyoming is, frankly, illogical. Let’s take prudent and carefully monitored steps to re-open America, and start with those 13 states.