The Most Important Covid Data in the Room: Florida

The original writeup is the second and now outdated paragraph and note addition of red to the graphic.?New data has arrived and recently delivered 919 additional recent retroactive deaths in a single update to Florida’s total.?Florida failed to post full data reliably to the sources which Worldometers relied upon.? This and other more recent data argue that most of what was seen graphically originally is not the case.?Additionally in the interim, the rough number of recent Regeneron treatments also became available (approx. 10,000) and while these treatments helped avoid some number of Covid deaths in a useful manner, the originally graphed trend line is mostly the result of data reporting issues. ?In the prior explanation no attempt was made to discriminate between data reporting issues or beneficial treatment.?Data reporting issues (a version of cooked books by delaying data inclusion as compared to past practice) is now the primary conclusion associated with the previously identified unusual data pattern.??Reinforcing this is today's headline: Florida changed its COVID-19 data, creating an 'artificial decline' in recent deaths.

The Delta Covid variant has driven daily new cases to the highest levels achieved in Florida for the entire pandemic in the current wave.?But something unique is going on in Florida.?The daily deaths due to Covid initially rose in its normal somewhat lagged fashion as infections climbed, but as new infections continued to climb aggressively, daily deaths due to Covid have plummeted.?Historically this pattern has not been seen in US data.?Two logical explanations (for which I will not provide the definitive answer to) are 1) Florida is massively cooking the data or 2) Florida is doing something different from other states that helps a lot or some interplay of the two.?There is either a massive data cheat or there is an indication that Florida is doing something different on the treatment versus the vaccination front.?The unexpected, marked decline in deaths when they should still be rapidly rising started in a similar, but possibly coincidental timing with Florida aggressively pushing and implementing new means of providing Regeneron’s antibody treatment.?Florida is currently providing the most interesting Covid data in the room, but only if we are paying attention.?No headlines yet for this counter narrative story about Florida and Covid.?As indicated, either there is a massive data cheat or a powerful road map for reducing the Covid crisis rapidly to a manageable level that has been successfully implemented.?Contradictory data often provides the greatest insights.?

Data and base graphics are from https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/usa/florida/ as of 8/21/2021.