Maryland has had a statewide mandate since 2015 and still has fire deaths. Doesn’t that prove it doesn’t work?

It proves the mandate covers new construction. Maryland’s housing stock, like everyone’s, is mostly homes built before the requirement, and that is where the deaths are. A mandate on new homes changes the numbers one house at a time, over decades. Nobody has ever claimed otherwise. The sooner you adopt the code, though, the sooner you start saving lives.