DeSantis’ hand-picked ‘experts’ can’t change reality of COVID-19
The many treatments President Trump has received forCOVID-19 don’t include hydroxychloroquine. So much for the one million doses of that junk cureGov. Ron DeSantis ordered for Florida.
Details about science, however, don’t bother the manwholong ago stoppedworking for Florida and startedworking for the Trump re-election campaign. Whenthe science doesn’t align with DeSantis, he tries to change the science.
OnSept. 25, DeSantis surprised counties and cities bymoving the state into Phase 3 of reopening. The three-page order came on a Friday and left local governments scrambling. All three South Florida counties issued different responses.
Aday earlier, DeSantis had convened one of thoseCOVID-19 panels he favors over taking hard questions fromreporters. None of the panelists is fromFlorida. All three, however, played their roles in backing DeSantis’ view that Florida should reopen as much as possible as soon as possible, going against the advice of public health experts in the state.
Jayanta Bhattachanya, Martin Kulldorff and Michael Levitt are credentialed men. Bhattachanya and Levitt aremedical professors at StanfordUniversity. Kulldorff teaches atHarvardMedical School. Levittwon the 2013Nobel Prize in chemistry.
They oppose lockdowns, believing that theUnited States should emulate Sweden and seek herd immunity, or whatTrumpcalled “herd mentality.” Theywant schools to fully reopen. Bhattachanya and Levitt favor an age-based response to the pandemic, freeing up younger people fromrestrictions and focusing on the elderlywhomake up most of the victims.
In lateAugust, DeSantis appeared with ScottAtlas, another member of the Stanford medical faculty and amember ofTrump’s COVID-19 task force. Atlas, whodisputes the need for mask-wearing, is not a public health specialist. Neither areBhattachanya, Kulldorff and Levitt.
Indeed, Bhattachanya drewcontroversy for a study that he co-authored. It suggested thatCOVID-19was more widespread but less lethal than believed. Stanford began an investigation after critics accused Bhattachanya and the others of slanting the results for political purposes.
DeSantis could have found any number of actual experts in Florida. Most of them, however, feel differently.
JayWolfson teaches public health at the University of South Florida inTampa. He acknowledged thatCOVID-19 deaths should “stabilize” as doctors learn more about managing the disease. ButWolfson said calls to reopen quicklywere “political statements.”
Yet DeSantis rolls on with his contrarian message, seeking to persuade Floridians and people beyond that everything you have heard outside theTrump orbit is bogus.
OnMonday, DeSantis cited aNational Review article that said lockdowns had no effect on containing the virus. InMay, a NationalReview article congratulated DeSantis for his management of the virus. Six weeks later, the state set a national one-day record for new cases and a state record for deaths.
It’s amysterywhy DeSantiswould expect anyone to heed his advice. Florida is approaching15,000 deaths. California, with nearly twice asmany residents, has only about10 percent moreCOVID-19-related fatalities.
The governor— like allRepublicans in Florida— would point toNewYork, which leads the nation with 33,000 deaths. The virus, however, came toNewYork from Europe three months beforeTrump issued a travel ban. If the main source ofCOVID-19 at that time had been South America, Florida could have beenNewYork.
DeSantis has tried for months to create an alternate reality. He recently referred to the “growing consensus” that lockdownswere a mistake. The governor’s new “experts” are the source of that “consensus.”
Meanwhile, reality intrudes. Regal Cinemas is closing theaters in South Florida indefinitely. Disney is laying off employees. DeSantis can beg people to see amovie or visit a theme park, but those industrieswon’t recover until the virus is much more under control.
I emailed DeSantis’ communications director a list of questions. No response came. My follow-up voicemailwas not returned.
The governor never has understood that economic health depends on public health. Trying to keep Florida safe forTrump does not make Florida safe for Floridians.