In New York City, Density Saves Lives, Too

New York’s coronavirus death toll is rawly staggering — as of April 24, more than 15,000 in the city are believed to have died from Covid-19-related reasons, magnitudes more than the 2,747 souls lost on 9/11. It’s easy, superficially, to blame the city’s density, and many have: Surely, so many people living, working, and traveling in close quarters caused Covid-19 to spread more easily. We don’t know that yet. But what we do know is that for the three decades leading up to this pandemic, New York ably used its density and wealth to increase life expectancy for its most vulnerable residents, saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Read Full Article »