During the COVID-19 pandemic, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was criticized and pressured by federal officials, such as President Joe Biden and public health czar Anthony Fauci, to back draconian restrictions. Now, criticism is coming from the opposite direction: Former President Donald Trump claims DeSantis’s policies were too severe, and that “Florida was closed for a long period of time.” I coauthored a Paragon Health Institute study that shows both criticisms are wrong. Florida implemented sensible COVID policies and its COVID performance was among the very best in the nation.
The Paragon study utilized an index of states’ COVID responses, including actions such as school and business closures and mask mandates, developed by Oxford University. The study compared the stringency of state government responses with a set of health, economic, education, and migration outcomes.
The stringency of state COVID restrictions was not significantly correlated with health outcomes, as measured by age- and health-adjusted COVID mortality and all-cause excess mortality. For example, Florida had one of the nation’s least restrictive COVID responses, but its age-adjusted COVID mortality rate was 8% lower than the median state.