Iowa Among States With Fewest Coronavirus Restrictions

Enter your number to get our free mobile app

It's been a CONSTANT debate during the Coronavirus pandemic: are Iowa and our governor doing enough to limit our citizens' exposure to the virus?

WalletHub studied 14 key metrics and said: "our data set ranges from whether child-care programs and restaurants have reopened to the presence or absence of a “shelter-in-place” order". With many other metrics factored in, and with overall ranking listed below for fewest restrictions in place, and the corresponding virus death rate ranking in parentheses, here is how we and some of our Midwest neighbors fared.

1. South Dakota (10)
2. North Dakota ( 33)
3. Wisconsin (21)
6. Missouri (13)
11. Iowa (36)
16. Nebraska (20)
18. Kansas (19)
24. Indiana (37)
25. Michigan (48)

Minnesota had more restrictions, putting them at #30 overall with a death rate ranking at 38, and Illinois, who had a full lockdown order for a while and in at #43, with a death rate ranking at 47.

Again, a lower ranking simply means more restrictions. Iowa could do better, but we could do a lot worse.

The only ideal death rate is zero, but that's not the case anywhere. Governor Reynolds did not place a "full" shelter-in-place order on Iowa in the midst of the pandemic like many states had. She came as close as you can without using the exact verbiage an we're still toward the "lower" end of COVID-related death rates.

See the full results of the study here.