1/ Who decided that 25 "cases" (positive tests) per 100,000 people is "red" risk level?
That's a positivity rate of 0.025% - far less than 1% and below the false positive rate of the tests (source: Cohen-Kessel, medrxiv.org/content/10.110…)
3/ "Red" level is the "TIPPING POINT," requiring stay-at-home orders.
0.025% positive tests is not any sort of tipping point, and in fact, no "tipping point" has happened anywhere. Cases go up, about 4 weeks later they go down, and after 8 weeks, most activity has subsided
1/ As we approach the end of the calendar year, it's interesting to look at Florida emergency room data and compare current levels to those at the beginning of the year (since we're back into respiratory virus season).
ED visits that result in cough-associated admissions:
2/ Visits that mention cough, fever, or shortness of breath:
The risk to people under the age of 20 is >1000 times lower than the risk to those over 70
2/ This information should be disseminated everywhere, but instead we hear that everyone can die of COVID, so everyone should avoid getting it. Yes, everyone can die of COVID, but if you're young, that's like saying you could die on your way to the grocery store.
3/ Those deaths happen, but they're rare enough that we don't let it affect our decisions about carrying on with life.
This failure of messaging has led to the acceptance of policies that were explicitly not recommended pre-COVID: