As of Thursday morning, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is running yet another victory lap. According to a release from DeSantis’ office, Florida now has one of the lowest rates of COVID-19 per capita. Which is true—at the moment. This comes, says the press release, because of DeSantis’ “leadership and a data-driven approach free of mandates.” This is at least the fourth time that DeSantis has declared himself a winner. That includes once in the spring of 2020 when he pushed businesses and schools to reopen even though the pandemic was just warming up, and another that fall when he stripped power from local officials and removed mask mandates from cities and counties, and another this spring when, as the Sun Sentinel reports, the Harvard- and Yale-educated Desantis bragged that he had scored a victory over the “elites” who warned that his polices could lead to disaster.
At the time, just under 33,000 Floridians had died from COVID-19. Six months later, the number is 59,000. Every victory lap DeSantis turns in seems to feature a higher body count.
Over the past six months, Florida spent weeks at the top of the charts when it came to COVID-19 cases per day. It rarely topped the charts for deaths, not because of DeSantis’ extremely limited program on monoclonal antibodies, but because Florida altered the way it reported those deaths, dribbling them out weeks late so that they didn’t appear in the day-by-day totals.
That last lap around DeSantis’ Ego Stadium didn’t just take the lives of at least 26,000 Floridians: It brought more than 1.6 million new cases to the state, leaving tens of thousands suffering the long-term effects of COVID-19.
That’s more deaths than all the hurricanes that have hit Florida in recorded history.
DeSantis has repeatedly bragged about his monoclonal antibody clinics, touting them as the solution to not only pressing vaccine mandates, but issuing executive orders that prevent any organization—from public schools to private companies—from requiring vaccination. But DeSantis bragging about the state administering “45,000 monoclonal antibody treatments to patients statewide at the 21 state treatment sites” is laughable.
Monoclonal antibodies are not designed for patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19. To be effective, they have to be given to patients in the early days, soon after testing positive or showing mild symptoms. In fact, the FDA Emergency Use Authorization for these antibodies prevents their use with patients who are either hospitalized or need breathing assistance of any kind. The treatments are also expensive, require hours to complete, and must be administered by medical personnel.
By DeSantis’ own numbers, the state has provided monoclonal antibody treatments to less than 3% of the Floridians who tested positive since the clinics were opened. Any effect that they’ve had on the overall number of hospitalizations or deaths in the state is negligible.
What may be the most darkly humorous statement in DeSantis’ latest self-congratulatory note is his insistence that “Without mandates or lockdowns, COVID-19 cases in Florida have decreased 90% since August.” They have. But only because Florida hit absolutely staggering numbers of new disease cases in August. In fact, Florida passed its all-time record, approaching 28,000 cases in a single day on Aug. 27. In that single month, there were 600,000 cases of COVID-19 in the state and 9,500 people died.
What DeSantis managed to do “without mandates or lockdowns” over the past six months is really staggering. He managed to take Florida into the top 10 states when it comes to deaths by population. In doing so, Florida became by far the largest state in the top 10 and reached the No. 3 position in overall deaths, racing past states which had suffered in the first days of the pandemic.
That means that, in a period when vaccines are available, treatment is much better understood, and ventilators were available, Ron DeSantis still managed to get Floridians killed at a rate over twice that of New York in the worst days of the first wave in the spring of 2020. That is … an accomplishment.
Oh, and along the way, DeSantis also managed to appoint a pandemic-skeptic surgeon general who, as the Tallahassee Democrat notes, “has history of being anti-science, anti-vaccine.” When that surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, went to meet with state Sen. Tina Polsky, she requested he wear a mask. That’s not just because wearing a mask is good practice at all times, especially in a state that is just coming down from the top of the national charts when it comes to COVID-19, but also because Sen. Polsky is undergoing treatment for breast cancer, and is immunologically compromised by that treatment. Sen. Polsky had not made public her diagnoses before this incident, but was forced to do so in the wake of Ladapo’s refusal to put on a mask.
Following this incident, Black Republican minister R.B. Holmes said he was changing his registration from Republican to independent. “We are extremely alarmed and saddened that the surgeon general would not meet with the elected state senator from Broward County when she asked respectfully, 'Will you please, sir, wear a mask,' " said Holmes. "For that top doctor to not wear a mask is disrespectful and dishonorable."
Holmes went on to slam Ladapo, DeSantis, and Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran, who has joined DeSantis in punishing schools that tried to protect students by requiring either masks or vaccination.
But not to worry: DeSantis has Ladapo’s back.
At the time, just under 33,000 Floridians had died from COVID-19. Six months later, the number is 59,000. Every victory lap DeSantis turns in seems to feature a higher body count.
Over the past six months, Florida spent weeks at the top of the charts when it came to COVID-19 cases per day. It rarely topped the charts for deaths, not because of DeSantis’ extremely limited program on monoclonal antibodies, but because Florida altered the way it reported those deaths, dribbling them out weeks late so that they didn’t appear in the day-by-day totals.
That last lap around DeSantis’ Ego Stadium didn’t just take the lives of at least 26,000 Floridians: It brought more than 1.6 million new cases to the state, leaving tens of thousands suffering the long-term effects of COVID-19.
That’s more deaths than all the hurricanes that have hit Florida in recorded history.
DeSantis has repeatedly bragged about his monoclonal antibody clinics, touting them as the solution to not only pressing vaccine mandates, but issuing executive orders that prevent any organization—from public schools to private companies—from requiring vaccination. But DeSantis bragging about the state administering “45,000 monoclonal antibody treatments to patients statewide at the 21 state treatment sites” is laughable.
Monoclonal antibodies are not designed for patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19. To be effective, they have to be given to patients in the early days, soon after testing positive or showing mild symptoms. In fact, the FDA Emergency Use Authorization for these antibodies prevents their use with patients who are either hospitalized or need breathing assistance of any kind. The treatments are also expensive, require hours to complete, and must be administered by medical personnel.
By DeSantis’ own numbers, the state has provided monoclonal antibody treatments to less than 3% of the Floridians who tested positive since the clinics were opened. Any effect that they’ve had on the overall number of hospitalizations or deaths in the state is negligible.
What may be the most darkly humorous statement in DeSantis’ latest self-congratulatory note is his insistence that “Without mandates or lockdowns, COVID-19 cases in Florida have decreased 90% since August.” They have. But only because Florida hit absolutely staggering numbers of new disease cases in August. In fact, Florida passed its all-time record, approaching 28,000 cases in a single day on Aug. 27. In that single month, there were 600,000 cases of COVID-19 in the state and 9,500 people died.
What DeSantis managed to do “without mandates or lockdowns” over the past six months is really staggering. He managed to take Florida into the top 10 states when it comes to deaths by population. In doing so, Florida became by far the largest state in the top 10 and reached the No. 3 position in overall deaths, racing past states which had suffered in the first days of the pandemic.
That means that, in a period when vaccines are available, treatment is much better understood, and ventilators were available, Ron DeSantis still managed to get Floridians killed at a rate over twice that of New York in the worst days of the first wave in the spring of 2020. That is … an accomplishment.
Oh, and along the way, DeSantis also managed to appoint a pandemic-skeptic surgeon general who, as the Tallahassee Democrat notes, “has history of being anti-science, anti-vaccine.” When that surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, went to meet with state Sen. Tina Polsky, she requested he wear a mask. That’s not just because wearing a mask is good practice at all times, especially in a state that is just coming down from the top of the national charts when it comes to COVID-19, but also because Sen. Polsky is undergoing treatment for breast cancer, and is immunologically compromised by that treatment. Sen. Polsky had not made public her diagnoses before this incident, but was forced to do so in the wake of Ladapo’s refusal to put on a mask.
Following this incident, Black Republican minister R.B. Holmes said he was changing his registration from Republican to independent. “We are extremely alarmed and saddened that the surgeon general would not meet with the elected state senator from Broward County when she asked respectfully, 'Will you please, sir, wear a mask,' " said Holmes. "For that top doctor to not wear a mask is disrespectful and dishonorable."
Holmes went on to slam Ladapo, DeSantis, and Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran, who has joined DeSantis in punishing schools that tried to protect students by requiring either masks or vaccination.
But not to worry: DeSantis has Ladapo’s back.