First, Ron DeSantis sold campaign T-shirts celebrating his rejection of science as tens of thousands of Floridians died preventable deaths from Covid.
Then, even as Florida recorded the first locally transmitted cases of malaria in the US in 20 years, DeSantis left key health leadership positions unfilled as he traveled the country promising to do to America exactly what he had done for Florida.
Now comes news that leprosy—a "neglected tropical disease" that the W.H.O. said was no longer a global health problem in 2000—has become "endemic" in Central Florida.
As CNN reports:
Left untreated, the disease can paralyze the hands and the feet, cause blindness, and cause fingers and toes to shorten. The infection is curable, but treatment involves a combination of antibiotics taken over a few years.
Also, a cure may not resolve things like nerve or skin damage in people whose diagnosis has been delayed, which is a common situation in the US, where doctors aren’t used to seeing the disease.
I wrote about "The Sad State of Florida" this time last year. And many of the problems that plagued the state then (even before the latest, more Biblical, plagues arrived) are as bad or worse in the summer of 2023.
Teachers are fleeing.
As the first day of school approaches, Florida continues to face one of the country's worst teacher shortages. This is perhaps not surprising in a state that now wants co-parent with Moms for Liberty and teach children that Anne Frank's Diary is "pornography" and slavery was a great job-training scheme.
Gen Z is abandoning Florida.
While DeSantis touts population growth as older Americans are still willing to take a chance on Florida despite the malaria, leprosy and rising sea levels, Gen Z-ers are leaving Florida by the thousands—and heading to cities like New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Philadelphia.
Florida's home insurance crisis is getting worse.
DeSantis fiddled as his state's home insurance crisis burned out of control last year. And this year it's even worse. Six insurers became insolvent in Florida in 2022 and property insurance premiums surged to more than $4,200 in Florida – three times the national average. In July, AAA and Farmer's pulled out, too. Meanwhile, DeSantis is still unwilling to accept the basic science of climate change.
Homelessness is surging.
DeSantis continues to tout the "success" of his Covid policies and his economic policies. But he leaves out the part about the housing crisis that's facing even middle-class Floridians. The Sunshine State surged past Texas to rank third in homelessness in 2022—and Florida's unhoused are suffering more than ever in this summer's blistering heat.
Florida is now America's "inflation hotspot."
Surviving in Florida under Ron DeSantis isn't easy—even if you avoid dying of Covid, malaria and leprosy.
Amid all the other cascading crises that Desantis has either caused or failed to address, he's also turned Florida into America's inflation hotspot.
Inflation in the Miami area soared more than 9% in the 12 months though April 2023—more than 2X the national average. Meanwhile, residents of Tampa/St. Pete saw prices jump 7.3% through May (vs. 1.8% in Minneapolis).
Disney moves out as leprosy moves in.
DeSantis' started his Presidential campaign with a pitch to "Make America Florida."
Meanwhile, his high-profile war on Disney continues to cost Florida jobs and opportunity.
As the extent of the DeSaster he's causing in Florida becomes better known a more apt slogan might be: "Less Disney. More Leprosy."
Thanks for reading! All content to Unprecedented is free—there's no paywall. Please feel free to share and sign up if you want to leave a comment. If you do enjoy the content, please support if you can...
Subscribe to Unprecedented
Subscribe to the newsletter and unlock access to member-only content.