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Comment by crooked-v | Hacker News Reader

On the other hand, California has a much lower death rate despite having cities with a population density in the same magnitude as NYC, which seems to suggest some level of luck of the draw here in initial unrecorded spread before lockdowns came into place.

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> California has a much lower death rate despite having cities with a population density in the same magnitude as NYC

New York is denser than any city in California.

"New York is far more crowded than any other major city in the United States. It has 28,000 residents per square mile, while San Francisco, the next most jammed city, has 17,000, according to data from the U.S. Census Bur"

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/23/nyregion/coronavirus-nyc-...

If it's just density, why does SF have so few deaths (20), fewer than cities much less dense than SF? eg Seattle is much less dense but has 15x as many deaths as SF. There is clearly an element of chance/which sub-population was infected/timing of responses in play here.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2020/04/07...

From another thread, subway?

Subway doesn’t explain why Seattle more than SF.

Basically only timing of shelter-in-place does.

Manhattan 69,467 per square mile (Wikipedia).

This doesn't explain Staten Island. Its population density is half of San Francisco's, its population half, but has had 533 deaths vs. SF's 20.

And a sibling thread mentioned the subway; it doesn't go to Staten Island.

I'm going to venture a guess that lifestyle is a huge factor in the difference. People are generally more active out west (better weather, more open spaces/ parks/ mountains, better beaches, etc.) and smoke far fewer cigarettes.

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