A new report published by the Committee to Unleash Prosperity compared state-by-state responses to the global Covid pandemic that began two years ago. The group concluded that Florida handled the emergency the best, New York the worst.

“Shutting down their economies and schools was by far the biggest mistake governors and state officials made during COVID, particularly in blue states,” Steve Moore, co-founder of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, told Fox News Digital. “We hope the results of this study will persuade governors not to close schools and businesses the next time we have a new virus variant.”

New York, California, New Jersey and Illinois were the worst in handling the outbreak.

“The study verifies other studies which have found that locking down businesses, stores, churches, schools, and restaurants had almost no impact on health outcomes across states,” the report concluded. “States with strict lockdowns had virtually no better performance in COVID death rates than states that remained mostly open for business.”

Read the full report here.