Florida got it right. Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a statewide “safer at home” executive order April 3 and then began to roll it back throughout most of the state on May 4. He was called a public menace when he allowed beaches, restaurants and other public places to reopen.

Instead, DeSantis maintained restrictions in hotspots, focused resources on protecting nursing home residents, and required travelers from states with high degrees of contagion to quarantine for 14 days on their arrival in the Sunshine State.

The result: Florida has just over 2,800 coronavirus deaths versus 24,000 in New York, even though Florida has two million more residents than New York and the largest percentage of people over 65 of any state in the nation.