[ekiru]

> So while you're right...by not using per Capita numbers... you're presenting your data in a very disengenuous and truth distorting way.

GP actually did speak in terms of per capita numbers (hence "population share"). In absolute numbers, California would exceed Florida in old people; as shares of the population, California has (according to your second link) 14.3% of their population over age 65, while Florida has 20.5%. This works out to be Florida having about 43% more old people per capita than California. If the claim upthread that deaths per capita in Florida more than doubled that in California is accurate, then 43% more people 65 or older per capita does not explain more than 100% more deaths per capita.

> Guess what STILL less than California. Guess what positivity rate at the BOTTOM of all states.

As to your positivity rate point, I can't confidently speak to whether your argument would be valid if the data was as you said, but your data is not accurate: your link lists Florida at the bottom of all states, but it also lists them as having a 0.0% positivity rate. The latter is, unsurprisingly, not correct, and neither is the former. Going through to its listed data source [1], I calculated positivity rates (number of positive results / number of total results) for each state using the data as of October 11 [2] (filtering for "date" equal to October 11 of this year).

Using cumulative numbers ("total_results_reported"), Florida has a positivity rate of 10.4% (18th highest), California has 5.7% (44th highest). Using new results with a date of October 11 ("new_results_reported"), Florida is doing better than earlier: only 4.6% positive (42th highest). Still twice California's 2.1% (53rd, below every other state and every US territory, but ahead of the District of Columbia).

1: https://healthdata.gov/dataset/COVID-19-Diagnostic-Laborator...

2: arbitrarily picked to be far enough back I could be sure I would not be missing data for some states due to reporting lag on the first try.

[nickthemagicman]

>> then 43% more people 65 or older per capita does not explain more than 100% more deaths per capita

Why doesn't it? Is there some evidence that it does or doesn't.... or is this more of a claim?

Is there direct evidence that it's masks and not the density and quantity of old people?

Old people makes way more sense to me than our current mask policy of wearing a dirty cloth on your face until you sit down at the restaurant.

Thank you for looking into that, in a hurry I just looked at the ranking.

>>Florida is doing better than earlier: only 4.6% positive (42th highest). Still twice California's 2.1% Still shockingly close, considering they have no Covid restrictions, whatsoever. And Cali has been extremely strict.

I guess it's subjective levels or risk. Is two percent lower infection rate worth it to require everyone to wear masks?

[ekiru]

>Why doesn't it? Is there some evidence that it does or doesn't.... or is this more of a claim?

For the difference to be explained solely by there being more old people because old people are more vulnerable to COVID, I would interpret that to mean that any particular individual is not more or less likely to die depending on whether they live in California or Florida and the overall difference is determined by the difference in age distribution. But, as a limiting case, if all COVID deaths were among elderly people, then a 100%+ higher overall death rate in Florida which has only a 43% larger share of its population who are elderly compared to California would require that deaths per capita among the elderly population would have to be ~40% higher in Florida than in California (2 / 1.43). It's possible that my intuition is making an error here, but I think that the situation with only elderly people dying is the upper bound on how much effect the age distribution can directly have. So, something further is necessary to explain the additional (at least) 40%.

> Is there direct evidence that it's masks and not the density and quantity of old people?

I don't know whether masks explain the cited difference (I haven't seen convincing evidence but I also haven't really examined the matter), just that age distribution cannot explain the entirety of the difference. At least some age groups must have been more likely to die due to COVID-19 if they lived in Florida than in California during the cited period. It's certainly possible that some portion of that additional difference can be explained through downstream effects of the age distribution, but demonstrating that would require some additional evidence beyond the bare fact of the age distribution differences.

My understanding is there were also other policy differences between the two states besides mask requirements, but I do not have any specific reason to believe them to have had a significant (or any) effect, just like I don't have any specific reason to believe that downstream consequences of the age distribution to have had a significant (or any) effect.

> I guess it's subjective levels or risk. Is two percent lower infection rate worth it to require everyone to wear masks?

I couldn't say, although it's also worth remembering that the positivity rate data in question doesn't tell you anything about the infection rate. It doesn't even tell you what proportion of people who got tested received positive results, since the data in question is about samples rather than patients.