Syag, I still do not fully understand your objections to my analysis. I agree that measuring at one particular moment is noisy. Epidemics indeed come in waves and time of waves is different at different locations. That is why I looked at cumulative rates over a year and specifically compared with nearby areas. The numbers were higher and there were similar reports from Israel, that I didn’t verify, so I don’t understand how you are saying that nothing bad happen. You bring not one number to support your position. Again, the numbers I brought have limitations, but they are quite suggestive.
Maybe you mean that you didn’t see people getting sick right after an event. This doesn’t refute statistics because the virus propagates thru the community with little symptoms until someone gets seriously sick and then you don’t see a connection. This is known in halakha that teshuva is hard when a person can’t connect two events, so I am not holding my breath to see people changing their minds.
I am not sure why you pepper your text with disparaging remarks though. I am very sad about all the losses we had and disturbed by the attitude of ostensibly observant Jews who do not care about lives. I am not excited about talking about it, not I am happy to see the data later that confirms initial warnings. Again, if you know of data that refutes it, please provide it. If you don’t have it yourself, maybe you can ask your experts. I am sure someone somewhere in your community used some logic to allow what you did. You should be interested in that