‘ It’s like invading armies’
GOVERNOR LAMONT REFLECTS ON HOW CONNECTICUT HAS COPED WITH COVID- 19
Every afternoon, Josh Geballe, the state’s chief operating officer and a point man on coronavirus, brings Gov. Ned Lamont the day’s charts, maps and data. Lately, the picture has been pretty good — best in the United States when we look at all the pieces of recovery together.
Lots of green, some yellow. That’s a far cry from the red that enveloped Connecticut back in April and early May, when the state’s weekly death rates and new infections were top five.
Then one day this month, Geballe brought out a map that startled Lamont.
“It was bright red over Connecticut again. And I said ‘ What the hell is going on?’ and he said, ‘ In this map, bright red means most likely to be wearing the mask.’ ”
Ah, that was a relief.
But as Lamont looks at where we are now, four months into the crisis, and at where we’ve been and where we’re going, he’s not taking an easy sigh.
“I’m nervous as a cat on a hot tin roof. I see what’s going on, I see these maps, you know, it’s like invading armies.”
I spoke with Lamont Friday about his role and the state’s role in fighting coronavirus, and it became clear with that comment and others. The same “Aw shucks” candidate of 2018 who became the matter- of- fact governor in 2019 has handled the leadership challenge of a lifetime in 2020 the way we’d expect.
Not many histrionics, steady volume, some wavering that comes from listening to too many people, willing to say things that will upset people — and mostly, the steady grind of a guy with long roots in the same place and a long strategy.
His message, as Connecticut sits with the lowest combination of new infections and percent of tests coming up positive, is that we can’t let up.
“I see western Pennsylvania, I see Delaware and I also know that we’ve had some small flareups in and around kids and parties,” he said. “And I know looking at Florida and Arizona that sometimes these small flareups can catch fire. So nothing is taken for granted.”
Sticking to the B- minus grade
Lamont has been quick to chide poor social distancing habits. He mentioned Darien and Norwich as examples of places where he’s heard about backsliding events. “They think they can’t get hurt or they’ve been pent up so long they can’t wait any longer,” he said. “They’re letting down their guard.”
And his assessment: We’ve done well by working together and, as with anything, we could have done better.
He’s sticking to the B- minus grade that he gave Connecticut a few weeks ago, down from an A- minus — largely because too many people, especially those Gen- Zers, are too willing to hold non- distanced parties and gatherings — as the states subject to quarantines edge closer and closer to Connecticut on those ubiquitous maps. “I think Connecticut has done really well, mainly thanks to the good people of Connecticut, taking the protocols seriously at the store level, at the office level, at the wearing- the- mask level, really leader of the pack on that front.”
This state, luckily for Lamont and for public health, has relatively few ideological opponents of safety measures that we see elsewhere, notably in red states. We saw a few right- wing protesters who showed up at the state Capitol Thursday, opposing absentee ballot expansions for elections amid coronavirus and, in a few cases, spreading the fake Gospel about how masks don’t work and how the science is wrong. That plays into the attitude Lamont has brought to this crisis: There are no clear answers, no black and white but we’re doing the best we can day by day. Personally, he has gotten better at wearing the mask, at least publicly, and keeping his distance — not a natural way of being for him.
Angering some folks
He declined to grade himself as governor in the crisis, saying, “I don’t really do that,” but in his telling, he’s clearly in charge as we can see in his daily presence either in the Ned Show briefings or on location around the state.
“I think the state closed in an appropriate way, explained it to people in an appropriate way. I couldn’t do that by fiat, I had to do it by explaining to people what our thinking was. Now we’re on the other side of that curve as we cautiously reopen.”
It hasn’t been all smooth. Some teachers, including the Connecticut Education Association, a key part of his political support, aren’t happy about the way he has pushed the back- to- school agenda — and a caravan at the Capitol and at the governor’s mansion Thursday drove that point home, literally. Some unemployed people and economic liberals were surprised he sided with conservatives in opposing an extension of the $ 600- a- week unemployment “true- up,” which ends this week. Some business owners take issue with reopening rules — in both directions.
Health care workers, again, led by a pro- Lamont union, SEIU 1199, say they have not seen enough protections and would have wanted a bill in special session. Others said the governor has been too slow to advance workers compensation protections to anyone on the front lines that contracted COVID- 19 — though a compromise order he issued Friday was meant to address that.
“My job is not to satisfy everybody. My job is to listen to everybody, have stakeholders at the table, make a decision and do the best I can to explain why it’s in the best interests of public health,” he said.
In his trademark style, Lamont downplays all of those disputes even as he holds to his positions.
“I think people still more or less understand what we’re doing, why we’re doing it. They see the results are working so far.”
Schools and nursing homes
Among teachers, for example, Lamont — who met with students and educators in New Haven Friday — says there’s a consensus “I talk to teachers every day. Teachers tell me there’s nothing more important than a kid in a classroom,” he said. “Okay, there’s some nuances there but we’re speaking more or less with one voice on this.”
He referred to surveys. “Right now, our analysis shows that the vast majority of teachers as well as students want to get back into the classroom, comma,” ( he pronounced that word, comma) “provided we put public health first and enforce the protocols that we outlined.”
As for students, “They’re willing to get together in a big party sometimes, I hope they’re willing to get together in a classroom as long as they’re careful about it.”
I asked what he would have done differently, especially in nursing homes and assisted living residences, which have accounted for a hair under three- quarters of all deaths in the state. A staggering 13 percent of nursing home residents died, a number that mutes any success the state may claim in wrestling COVID- 19.
Preventing nurses and other employees from moving from one facility to another may have saved lives. Could he have ordered it? “These are all private entities so it’s not simply a matter of fiat and obviously when nurses went from one home to another they were serving a vital need in that other home,” Lamont said. “But I think in hindsight in many cases they carried the virus with them and that shouldn’t have happened.”
On the other hand, early on, he and the industry barred visitors, including family members. “My phone was ringing off the hook when we did it.”
And robust testing, which would have helped early on in and out of nursing homes, was simply not available. “That would have made a big difference.”
‘ A bat out of hell’
His overall assessment: “I think we worked with the hand we were dealt pretty well.”
That hand was affected by federal government policy which was, of course, slow on the uptake when the crisis hit Wuhan, China — though Lamont praised the government’s speed in backing private development of vaccines, such as at Pfizer in Groton and Protein Sciences in Meriden.
“I paid attention to this early. I look around the world and Wuhan is not as far away for me as it is for most folks,” he said. “Imagine if we had gotten everything we needed two months in advance because we planned on it.”
Does he blame President Donald Trump? “It starts at the top,” he said. The Northeast governors “had to speak loudly with one voice … and we had somebody contradicting us out of the White House every day back then.”
Lamont said he doesn’t recall a moment after the peak of the crisis in April when he saw the easing. “All I did was hope that that peak started going in the other direction and say a little prayer.”
The moment that stands out for him was the start — Friday, March 6.
“Nothing brought it home for me and the people of Connecticut like that day we sped like a bat out of hell over to Danbury Hospital and stood there to announce the first Connecticut infection. That was the day that Connecticut really woke up more broadly and knew we were under attack.”
Adifferent Connecticut governor sped to that same part of the state on Dec. 14, 2012, to Sandy Hook, for a different crisis — which, like this one, would define his tenure in office.
‘ Now you’re one’
Lamont talks about bringing the hospitals together, and what he recalls saying. “Hey Hartford, Stamford is going to need some help, they’re going to need some support. I know you guys have always been sort of competing systems. Now you’re one. Connecticut’s one.”
In his recollection, the state has moved through the crisis without partisan politic s. “We got a lot done in a short period of time,” he said. “It really was a very different mindset, which I hope we carry some of that with us going forward.”
Looking ahead to a possible resurgence, he’s not making predictions.
“I never say, ‘ We’ve turned the corner.’ I’m scared. Look what happened in Arizona. They went from nothing, then the hockey stick. That all happened in two weeks and it started with the positivity rate which they didn’t focus on as early as they should have. And they did reopen too early. “That’s something we did not do in Connecticut. So I’d like to think we’re more like Europe than we are like Texas. But time will tell.”