“A single and coordinated strategy might have brought us to a different place,” says Dr. Jon Samet, dean of the Colorado School of Public Health. “Even within some states, counties may proceed independently. There is wide variation in the credence given to misinformation, some sourced from the Administration and even the President.”
In some ways, however, Colorado is an outlier in the new wave—or at least lies at its very vanguard. The first wave hit hardest in the Northeast; the second in the South and the West. Now, even as cases balloon in the South again , the Midwest has surpassed the West in cases, with dramatic spikes from Wisconsin and Minnesota to the Dakotas and down to Utah and Wyoming:
“Given that these are rural areas, behaviors of individuals are likely to be a dominant driver: not adhering to distancing and not wearing masks,” says Samet. “Checking across mask orders in these states, there is a wide range. I suspect adherence to use of masks is lower in these rural counties than in urban areas, as in Colorado by anecdotal reports.”that in turn affect the regional situation.