Or maybe something like temperature or humidity, since California is also doing much worse than Florida (27% v 17%) for simple excess deaths this year: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/14/us/covid-19-d...

I think it is clear we still don’t understand fully the driving risk and safety factors across different regional areas, let alone continents and hemispheres. I don’t know how we ever could at this time or what we could do about it.

Edit: And examining average death rate instead provides a different story as well: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-03-09/covid-19...