![]() Hawai´i’s population represents 1.4 million of those, or approximately 1/235th of all people residing in the country.īased on the 29 million cases identified nationwide since the pandemic began, and taking into account Hawai´i’s population compared to that of the entire US, the islands should have seen 125,000 COVID-19 infections to this point in the pandemic. Green on Friday offered statistics of his own to show the dramatic impact coronavirus safety protocol has had on the state’s population.Ī total of 330 million people live in the United States. “Had we done nothing, we could have had 10 million travelers over that time, a large number of them positive (for COVID-19).” “We have the Pacific Ocean, as well as the Safe Travels Program to eliminate 70% to 80% of cases that would have come in (post lockdown in October),” Green said. The Hawai´i-centric statistics the group is using to claim that virus restrictions are unnecessary (fewer flu deaths than COVID-related deaths) were only possible because of the very COVID-related restrictions the group wants to see eliminated. These restrictions, along with social distancing and mask-wearing mandates ⚊ precisely the safety protocols that Melendez and her group speak out explicitly against ⚊ are the sole reasons that COVID-19 deaths in Hawai´i over the last calendar year have been lower than influenza deaths in previous years. ![]() Following that time period, Hawai´i instituted the Safe Travels Program, which implements a mandatory 10-day quarantine and requires pre-travel testing (and sometimes layered testing, depending on the county) for any who wish to exempt themselves from it. 15, 2020 ⚊ protected the state when the contiguous 48 on the mainland could do little to meaningfully halt interstate movement. A roughly seven-month ban on untested, non-essential travel ⚊ from March 24 to Oct. Hawai´i was also the beneficiary of unmatched geographic isolation. “We had much better mask wearing (compliance) ⚊ consistently over 90%,” Green said. The increase in the death rate made 2020 the deadliest year in recorded US history, with COVID-19 related illness registering as the third-highest cause of death in the nation behind cancer and heart disease. That is according to data generated by Johns Hopkins University. Without those restrictions in place, health experts say the number of human lives claimed by COVID-19 would certainly be exponentially higher, resulting in a US death toll easily eclipsing a tally in the millions.Įven with all the measures enacted, precautions taken and hardships endured across the country in an effort to stifle the coronavirus pandemic over the last year, the US death rate increased by 15%. In fact, Green said, the data proves the exact opposite. These statistics do not prove COVID-19 safety protocols were unnecessary because so many people fell ill and died. This total is 15-times greater than the number of influenza-related illness from the most recent year of US data available, and it has occurred despite lockdowns, travel restrictions, social distancing requirements, and mask wearing protocols across the nation.īut that is not an effective argument against restrictions. The CDC is the same source of Hawai´i flu deaths referenced by Melendez above.Įxamining a little more than one year of coronavirus data, Johns Hopkins University has confirmed over 532,000 Americans have died due to complications from COVID-19. The reason why is the context provided by larger virus trends that Melendez and her fellow anti-COVID restriction advocates omit from the arguments they set forth.ĭuring the 2018-19 flu season, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated just over 34,000 individuals living in the United States died from influenza/pneumonia-related illness. US President Joe Biden and the nation’s top health officials have decried decisions in states like Texas to abolish all COVID-related safety protocols and open economies back up to 100% capacity, referring to those moves as premature and, in Biden’s own words, “Neanderthal thinking.” ![]() ![]() “Their people are mask-free while Hawai´i is still enforcing mask mandates.” “Currently (15) states have lifted their coronavirus restrictions,” Melendez wrote in an email to Big Island Now. One of the primary spokespeople for the Big Island-based group of anti-restriction advocates, Michelle Melendez, said the statistics above justify a rollback of coronavirus safety protocols. There is not a health expert in Hawai´i who will dispute these flu and COVID death tally numbers. One has to go back to 2014 to find a flu season that produced fewer deaths statewide (438) than did COVID since it was unleashed a little more than one year ago. The year prior, that total was 637 individuals. In 2018, a total of 526 people died from influenza/pneumonia-related causes. ![]()
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