1. Blue states tend to be based on large urban areas. In New York, for a example, the virus was not a serious issue in counties located too far away that a daily commute to New York is unrealistic. This suggests that a suburban or rural lifestyle with heavy reliance on private cars is healthy, and an urban lifestyle is not.
2. It isn’t clear how “deadly” the virus is until they compare total death rates. Roughly three million Americans would have died in 2020 given the normal death rate, and so far the virus seems to have only been a drop in the bucket. Historic plagues cause massive increases in the death rate,
3, Literature and mass media are big on “apocalyptic” themes, which may explain the massive overreaction, Note the frum organizations and media also overreacted.