Let's see what you home-town paper has to say about Gov. DeSantis' leadership... “Who’s in charge?” Desantis’ hands-off governing sows confusion in vaccine rollout Gov. Ron DeSantis’ governing style continues to frustrate Floridians during the pandemic. https://www.tampabay.com/news/flori...-governing-sows-confusion-in-vaccine-rollout/ When Gov. Ron DeSantis held a Monday news conference to announce seven “community vaccination sites” run by Orlando Health, he urged elderly Floridians to register at the hospital chain’s website. “To receive a vaccine at one of Orlando health’s locations, you just have to visit vaccine.orlandohealth.com and register online,” he said. “Of course, supply is still limited, so we ask that you bear with us.” His instructions were incorrect. A spokeswoman for the hospital chain later clarified that the online portal DeSantis cited only allowed local front line health care workers, hospital employees, their families and residents and staff of long term care facilities to register — not the general public. Ten months into the coronavirus pandemic, DeSantis’ hands-off governing style is still frustrating Floridians, health care industry groups and elected officials. Where they struggled to decipher the governor’s vague or conflicting orders at the start of the pandemic, they’re now scrambling to adapt to his ever-changing vaccination strategy. In the last month, mayors in Miami-Dade have begged DeSantis for a phone call. Long-term care facilities resorted to contacting the media to get the governor’s attention. State hospital officials, including DeSantis’ former health secretary, continued to assert that his decision to have hospitals vaccinate the public saddled them with an unprecedented logistical task with COVID-19 hospitalizations surging. The result has led to desperate seniors flooding health department websites and tying up phone lines, signing up for fake vaccine appointments and sleeping in their cars outside public health centers, embarrassing images of incompetence and confusion for the nation’s third-largest state. “We don’t really know what to do,” said Mary Ann Carlson, a 77-year-old from Pompano Beach who called a Times/Herald reporter because it was the only phone number she could find, aside from her local CVS. “It changes every day.” Florida is not alone in encountering chaos and confusion during the largest vaccine rollout in American history. The federal government controls the number of vaccines distributed, and it’s drastically downsized original estimates. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who DeSantis often criticizes, has also struggled to communicate changing plans. But for DeSantis, a little-known congressman with no executive experience before becoming governor in 2019, confusion has been a constant since March, when the pandemic tested his insular management style. As he issued vague or conflicting orders, made erroneous claims and echoed President Donald Trump on a variety of issues, he saw his poll numbers drop and criticism rise. Much of the rollout’s disarray can be traced to a lack of transparency. DeSantis publicly released just one plan disclosing how vaccines would be distributed in Florida — and it was a thinly-detailed draft from October. Once the vaccines debuted, he quickly deviated from it. He announced in late December that Floridians 65 and older would be the first in the general population to be vaccinated, ahead of essential workers and younger people with underlying health conditions, as the draft states. Meanwhile, DeSantis has filled the void with sporadic and confrontational news conferences. During one distracting exchange on Monday, DeSantis berated a CNN reporter for making what he called a “speech.” On Tuesday, he avoided the media, meeting with top officials at Tampa General Hospital and holding a news conference at an Ocala Publix while notifying a select few reporters. His office emailed his schedule just before 5:30 p.m. — well after the day’s events. The overall lack of details on such a massive logistical challenge has frustrated many. “I read through (the October plan) a million times trying to find the fine print. There’s no fine print,” said Severine Petras, CEO and co-founder of Priority Life Care, which manages 30 long-term care facilities in 10 states, including five in Florida. “If I were to put a plan like that together for my evacuation plans, or for generators, like the state made us do, we’d have been shut down.” She said that in Indiana, where the company is based, her staff has been able to reserve vaccine appointments through a single state website. Florida requires people go to individual county websites to make appointments. Petras said her Florida facilities had vaccination appointments scheduled by CVS, then abruptly canceled. When she asked why, she said the company’s representative blamed it on the governor’s office. (They’ve since been rescheduled.) “They literally responded that the governor’s office didn’t make assisted living facilities a priority,” she said “It’s like, who’s in charge of this?” DeSantis’ office has also been unable, or unwilling, to say how many vaccine doses Florida has received and where they’ve been distributed. He’s given conflicting information on who will be vaccinated and when. Neither his office nor the Department of Health have communications directors to help inform the press and public about his strategy. And like he did at the start of the pandemic, DeSantis has shifted responsibility for the vaccine rollout to county health departments and local hospitals, overwhelming them with demand while simultaneously threatening to take away vaccine doses from hospitals that don’t administer them fast enough. The county health departments in Florida report to the state health department in Tallahassee, not to county government officials. “The web sites are crashing because each individual jurisdiction has their own web site or a phone line,” said state Sen. Linda Stewart, D-Orlando. “It’s as confusing as it could possibly get.” For the last week, Ken Dubbin, 67, a former cruise industry executive from Coral Gables, tried to get information about Miami-Dade vaccination plans, keeping the Jackson Health website open all weekend and waiting for it to “flip the switch” on vaccination appointments. On Tuesday, it worked. He was able to schedule an appointment for Tuesday afternoon. While his vaccination went smoothly, he said the problem with the rollout has been a failure of communication from the top. “I was in corporate America for 40 years, and for some things it makes sense to decentralize, but some things it doesn’t,” Dubbin said. “Had the state created a template that counties could modify for their needs, it would have been a lot smoother.” DeSantis on Monday avoided any mention of the problems with the vaccine rollout — the long lines, the inconsistent messaging and the crashed websites. DeSantis spokeswoman Meredith Beatrice said the governor was working with hospitals, health care providers and local hospitals, and he ordered the state Division of Emergency Management to help with the rollout. “Demanding accountability isn’t always popular, but thankfully, Governor DeSantis is more focused on doing the right thing,” she said in a statement. “While it’s unfortunate that certain individuals are detracting from this all important mission, Governor DeSantis is more interested in results.” One of DeSantis’ unannounced visits on Tuesday was to visit Tampa General Hospital CEO John Couris, who said afterward that the governor was identifying and fixing the problems. “There’s no playbook for this type of public health crisis,” Couris said. “So we’ve been writing the playbook as we go.” While there’s no playbook, public health experts said planning and clear communication can alleviate much of the frustration. “In basic public health, in vaccinology, it’s well recognized that vaccine rollouts require extensive planning and communication,” said Glenn Morris, director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute at the University of Florida. “It’s not just, ‘We’ll dump the vials of vaccine on your back steps and we’ll figure out what to do next.” “Not many states really appear to have done the months of preparation necessary for a massive vaccination campaign. We’re seeing that in the state of Florida.”
Only you care what my hometown paper says. I certainly don't give a shit what it says and I certainly don't give a shit what your hometown paper says. I think the Times makes great bird cage paper.
"DeSantis for the win" -- It will take months to vaccinate seniors edition. Frustration mounts over COVID-19 vaccine; seniors may have to wait for months https://www.sun-sentinel.com/corona...0210105-w3wk4at6obbn5kstgc4syin6kq-story.html Anger and frustration grew Tuesday as senior citizens lined up for hours to get a COVID-19 vaccine that has proven elusive as registration systems collapse and supplies run low. Some public officials assailed Gov. Ron DeSantis for misleading seniors into thinking they would get vaccinated more easily. Broward Mayor Steve Geller warned that it may be months before seniors — let alone anyone else — are vaccinated against the deadly coronavirus. Meanwhile,the number of COVID-19 cases is soaring. Florida on Tuesday reported 15,431 new cases and 98 more residents dead. In Boca Raton, hundreds of residents at Century Village stood in line for hours in the sun waiting to be inoculated at the 55-and-over gated community. Many bemoaned what they called a haphazard system of distributing the vaccine. (More at above url)
So how about we compare NY to Fl new cases since day one:- Black line couldn't be lined up exactly at 0, 1 is close enuf for gubmint work. Crazy spike up far left last winter in NY, then an almost equally large spike (other direction) when we got hit down here in early summer. Moved back to 0 line and gave indication of going much higher because of obviously colder temps up north. Meanwhile if DeSanity and his policies were actually the right policies ratio should be way higher than it is currently. Anyone thinking DeSanity might get a clue when Chumpie is permanently on the golf course or in Leavenworth is not living in the real world. Vaccine will probably be only savior to his incompetence/obstinance.
have you considered other variables? For instance... excess death studies... Virtually every study from all over the world... seems to shows that at some point in time in most countries there is a big spike in deaths above the baseline... and then a period of time below the baseline. a few months of excess deaths... followed by a lack of them almost as if the virus... killed off many of the people who were dying soon. In another words... its very hard to tell if any government has done anything useful in fighting this virus. (in general) It would be nice if govt statisticians did the type of work... which pointed out which countries may have done something that was outside 2 standard deviations. Its the lack of data... that is what is so insidious about our got responses. We should have had politicians once a week showing us who what and where and maybe why...
Well this week in North Carolina we got to see what happens when counties imitate Florida.. As predicted by the state leadership some rural counties that did not follow state instructions were "Florida-style disasters". Some counties (mainly rural) in North Carolina are rolling out Phase 1b vaccinations for people over 75 this week. To provide some context... the state leadership provided instructions to counties on the proper distribution of vaccines -- including the need to hire outside third party contact centers to handle the appointment call volume (and also provide the sign-up websites). There are 100 counties in North Carolina. At least 30 rural counties led by Republicans decided to not follow the state's instructions on how to make appointments and distribute the vaccines. These are the same rural counties that do not enforce masks, social distancing, etc. which are currently being overwhelmed by COVID cases whose leadership are COVID-deniers. These counties decided they did not want to spend the money on third party contact centers and simply had their residents call their single county health department line with one person answering it -- which was quickly overwhelmed. So what did these rural counties with poor leadership do. Simply tell elderly people over 75 to come down to the health department office and sit in line. Of course, this led to the same disastrous situation as Florida -- except our temperatures are colder in North Carolina (Snow is expected Friday). Person County (called "Trumpland") had to call in the police to control the chaos. Several other rural counties endured long lines. Some rural counties had to stop their efforts after 1 day waiting for the National Guard which Gov. Cooper called up to help them with vaccine distribution. A couple counties (Wilson, etc.) took a one day break to get contact centers and/or IT set-up to handle appointment volume under IT leaders sent by the state. For other counties... the state is forcefully taking over the effort due to their extreme failure (with national guard, state health department, and state IT). It should be noted in North Carolina that the state leadership immediately sends in help including the national guard to help the local governments with vaccine distribution -- unlike Florida where the DeSantis administration is doing nothing. Naturally the counties which followed the state's instructions, used contact centers for appointment sign-ups, and have knowledgeable leadership encountered no problems. Yet despite the problems North Carolina encountered in rural counties not following proper guidance... our level of COVID distribution issues to the elderly does not even approach the level of Florida.
Little Ronnie has been carrying Trump's water for years... How far does Trump need to go before DeSantis says something negative about the President's supporters. Now we know. 'Perpetrators must face the full weight of the law': Gov. Ron DeSantis reacts to violence at US Capitol The governor's sentiments are joined by several Florida Republican leaders who are among those either evacuating or sheltering in place. https://www.firstcoastnews.com/arti...kdown/67-0324524c-8f40-4b7f-89db-e17d081bcd92 Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a supporter of President Donald Trump, is calling the storming of the U.S. Capitol by pro-Trump supporters "unacceptable." He's referencing the hoards of people who have sent the U.S. Capitol into lockdown over protesting the counting of Electoral College votes that would affirm President-elect Joe Biden's victory. “Violence or rioting of any kind is unacceptable and the perpetrators must face the full weight of the law. The Capitol Police do an admirable job and I thank them for their hard work," DeSantis told 10 Tampa Bay. The governor's sentiments are joined by several Florida Republican leaders who are among those either evacuating or sheltering in place. Sen. Marco Rubio called the situation "anti-American anarchy," while Rep. Vern Buchanan called the acts "sickening and unacceptable. The National Guard and other federal agencies have been activated to contain the scene as President Trump has begun calling for peace and for his supporters "you have to go home." Amid violence, Trump is still falsely attesting that he won the 2020 presidential election. Trump's Former Attorney General Bill Barr and a federal cybersecurity agency said there was no evidence of fraud in the 2020 election.
Senator Scott demands investigation of DeSantis' failed vaccine distribution in Florida... Scott demands federal probe of Florida's vaccine distribution DeSantis already has been under fire for the bumpy rollout of vaccinations. https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/07/rick-scott-florida-vaccine-distribution-probe-456027