Reply #10: I assume you assume no one else died of natural causes during that time?

[Brotherjohn]

My point being I believe facts make it clear that additional people, above and beyond the natural death rate, died. We can never know how many more died than would have naturally.

So I am not comparing against 0 deaths in the population... some people of course died anyway. All indications, however, are that many people died at least indirectly from the evacuation, and the circumstances it put them in.

19 is small, yes. But you are comparing apples and oranges when you compare it to the natural death rate. Sure, 150K die a year in Texas. So does that mean 20, or 40 deaths due to a hurricane (evacuation or winds or flood) are meaningless? Of course not. We expect death as part of life. We don't expect premature deaths that are unnecessarily caused by over-reaction.

7 people in Harris County ALONE died of hyperthermia. Are you saying these 7 people would have died sitting at home (AC or not) rather than trapped in a car for hours (if not days) in 100 degree heat?

And as for the 23 people who died in the bus (sorry, I read 24 elsewhere), it matters not whether the evacuation was mandatory or voluntary... the point is evacuation has risks, which were played out horribly there. Those people CERTAINLY would not have died that day if they were at their rest home.

I commend Texas authorities as well for mandatory evacuations in areas such as Galveston, and even Matagorda and Corpus. Low-lying coastal areas like that were always much more at risk than Houston proper. I do not, however, think a mandatory evacuation was merited for any substantially-inland community at many feet above sea level.

As another post points out, that's what shelters are for (if you do not trust your abode).