by Eric Lendrum
A new study by the Committee to Unleash Prosperity found that states led by Republicans did a better job than Democrat-led states at managing the coronavirus and keeping their states from slumping into an economic and social recession.
As reported by The Daily Caller, the three states that ranked the worst in mortality, economy, and schooling during the COVID pandemic were New Jersey, New York, and California, all of which had implemented some of the strictest lockdown measures in the nation. By contrast, the states that ranked the highest were Utah, Vermont, and Nebraska.
“The one piece of good news in this study,” the report reads, “is that states which maximized the individual freedoms of business owners, consumers, workers and parents – and allowed their citizens to make their own risk assessments without government mandates – had the best performance.”
The three worst states, along with Illinois, all saw “high age-adjusted death rates; they had high unemployment and significant GDP losses, and they kept their schools shut down longer than almost all other states.”
Ranking just behind the top three best states were several more Republican-led states, including the state of Florida, which maintained an average mortality rate despite also having high economic activity. Florida came in 6th, behind Montana and South Dakota. The states that ranked the worst in terms of mortality were Nevada, New York, New Jersey, and Washington D.C.
The study further proved that lockdowns on travel, dining, and education had little to no impact on mortality rates or otherwise preventing the spread of the disease.
“The study verifies other studies which have found that locking down businesses, stores, churches, schools, and restaurants had almost no impact on health outcomes across states,” the report continued. “States with strict lockdowns had virtually no better performance in COVID death rates than states that remained mostly open for business.”
The findings of the report thoroughly debunk the narrative that had often been shared by Democrats and the mainstream media, claiming that Republican-led states reopening their economies and schools early into the pandemic would result in more deaths.
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Eric Lendrum graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he was the Secretary of the College Republicans and the founding chairman of the school’s Young Americans for Freedom chapter. He has interned for Young America’s Foundation, the Heritage Foundation, and the White House, and has worked for numerous campaigns including the 2018 re-election of Congressman Devin Nunes (CA-22). He is currently a co-host of The Right Take podcast.
Photo “Women Wearing COVID Masks” by Surprising_Shots.
