NPR looked at deaths per 100,000 people in roughly 3,000 counties across the U.S. from May 2021, the point at which vaccinations widely became available. People living in counties that went 60% or higher for Trump in November 2020 had 2.7 times the death rates of those that went for Biden. Counties with an even higher share of the vote for Trump saw higher COVID-19 mortality rates.
In October, the reddest tenth of the country saw death rates that were six times higher than the bluest tenth, according to Charles Gaba, an independent health care analyst who’s been tracking partisanship trends during the pandemic and helped to review NPR’s methodology. Those numbers have dropped slightly in recent weeks, Gaba says: “It’s back down to around 5.5 times higher.”
The trend was robust, even when controlling for age, which is the primary demographic risk of COVID-19 mortality. The data also reveal a major contributing factor to the death rate difference: The higher the vote share for Trump, the lower the vaccination rate.
I put the blame on the various RW mis-information media sources, that RW followers rely on for their news. Unfortunately, a lot of it is not based in reality.
The cynic might say it is a concerted effort by RW media (that supports the R party) is pushing this narrative knowing if Covid is still an issue, it will hurt the economy. If the economy is bad, that helps R’s get elected, in '22 and .24.
“The trend was robust, even when controlling for age, which is the primary demographic risk for COVID-19 mortality.”
That is the honest but very limited consideration given to age differences between left leaning and Trump supporters. Do you think Trump voters tend to be more in their 70s or college age?
And yet all these figures are given without adjusting for age differences.
I am all for vaccinations myself and think the concerns over them are exaggerated. However, the obvious bias of the article makes it of doubtful use. And it is NPR.
Show us the figures controlled for age and ethnic group, then get back with us.
They said that they controlled for age, meaning they took that into account and it was not the explanation for the higher death rate. For example, Florida’s death rate for people 75+ is decent compared to the rest of the US. Their death rates for ages 35-74 is much higher than most other states, so an older population is not a factor in how poorly FL has done with covid.
They said the difference was “still robust” when controlled for age. Then they proceeded to give us the figures that were not controlled for age. Why? What would all these figures and graphs look like when controlled for age? They do not show us those. Then they end the article with cherry picked anecdotes. This is a political article, not a scientific article.
And your conclusion about Florida is not self evident. The difference among older people may still be the major difference in Florida, since deaths are overwhelmingly among older people. The age difference among younger people may be huge but contribute less to any overall difference. To the extent there is a higher average mortality rate in Florida, all you say may be true but most of the difference could still be due to more old people in Florida.
At this point, can we really blame misinformation anymore? I think it’s just outright obstinacy sorted by partisanship.
We’re going to continue to have inflation,” Senator Rick Scott, who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told The Wall Street Journal earlier this month, “and then interest rates will go up. This is a gold mine for us.”
No cynicism required. The Republicans are openly working against the country via obstruction and culture war nonsense.
More important, in fact critical, would have been a break out by age, secondarily a break out by ethnic group. Surely you realize that adjusting county data by age would have at least as great an effect as doing this to state data? When your big break out is by voting history…well.
Just title the article “Voting for Trump Kills You” and be done with it.
Given the fact that Trump knew if the economy tanked, it would hurt his chances of re-election.
Also, part of the message was Democrats were hyping Covid up, to make that happen.
Democrats never did anything to hamper the efforts to try to control the virus…on the contrary, they were advocating masks and distancing…and once vaccines were available, to get the shot ASAP.
Now, it is the R’s hoping the virus is still an issue, and are actively doing things to try to make that happen…knowing if the economy is bad, it helps them in '22 &'24
