Eliza Barclay and Alexia Fernández Campbell at Vox report that Data shows hurricane deaths in Puerto Rico could be over 1,000:
More than two months after Hurricane Maria slammed into Puerto Rico and devastated the island — knocking out its power grid and leaving millions without potable water — the official death toll has stayed surprisingly low at 62.
Yet no one who’s been following Puerto Rico’s hurricane disaster closely believes that to be an accurate representation of the lives taken by the storm. Journalists on the ground in Puerto Rico and here on the mainland have helped paint a very different picture of underreported deaths, prompting members of Congress to demand audits of the death count.
Now two social science researchers have shown that the actual death count may be closer to 1,085, a number that exceeds the government’s official figure by a factor of 18. (By comparison, at least 1,800 people died in connection to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 — the deadliest hurricane to hit US soil in the past 50 years.)
Alexis Santos, a Puerto Rican demographer at Penn State, and Jeffrey Howard, an independent health scientist and epidemiologist, calculated average monthly deaths from 2010 through 2016 using a methodology that other researchers have told Vox is one of the best ways to calculate estimates of disaster deaths.
Santos and Howard used the Puerto Rico Vital Statistics System to compare the historical averages for September and October of the past seven years to the total number of September and October 2017 deaths recently reported by the Puerto Rico Department of Public Safety to see if there were notable differences.
The results were staggering: They found that in September 2017 — the month that Maria hit — there were 518 more deaths than the recent historical average for September and 567 more deaths in October 2017 than the recent historical average for October. That’s a total of 1,085 deaths likely linked to the hurricane. And given that widespread power outages have continued into November, the number of indirect deaths from the hurricane is probably higher still. [...]
TOP COMMENTS • HIGH IMPACT STORIES
QUOTATION
“...the whole of American life was organized around the cult of the powerful individual, that phantom ideal which Europe herself had only begun to outgrow in her last phase. Those Americans who wholly failed to realize this ideal, who remained at the bottom of the social ladder, either consoled themselves with hopes for the future, or stole symbolical satisfaction by identifying themselves with some popular star, or gloated upon their American citizenship, and applauded the arrogant foreign policy of their government.”
~Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men, 1931
TWEET OF THE DAY
BLAST FROM THE PAST
On this date at Daily Kos in 2004—Powell: won’t seek political office:
While yesterday's Q-poll showed Colin Powell polling decently in hypothetical NY governor and senate races, the integrity-free outgoing secretary of state says he's not interested.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said Thursday he won't seek political office, dismissing suggestions that he run for governor or senator in New York.
Asked about a poll that shows him favored in a hypothetical matchup for the governor's race, Powell said, "I'm not going to be running for office even in my beloved home state of New York, as flattering as that poll might be." [...]
"I don't think I've ever said I wouldn't be interested in public life again," Powell said. "I think I've repeatedly said over the course of nine-plus years that I've had no interest in political office."
The GOP bench in NY is exactly one man deep without a Powell candidacy — Giuliani. Expect state Republicans to keep talking up a Powell candidacy over the next two years as they grow increasingly desperate in their efforts to take on HIllary and hold the governorship.
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show: Guess what? A new study shows spikes in GunFAILs after spikes in GunSALEs. You’re welcome, USA! Roy Moore, like most Republicans, thinks America is a hellhole. Gop strategy: tax bills & public policy so offensive and horrific, no one will believe it’s real.
YouTube|iTunes|LibSyn|Patreon|Square Cash (Share code: Send $5, get $5!)