A Heartlander’s Plea: End the Lockdowns

MY family has been hit hard by the novel coronavirus. The virus itself hasn’t affected us. To date, there have been only 6,432 cases in my home state of Utah, with its population of more than 3 million people. But the fallout from the lockdowns has devastated my ability to provide for my family. My wife and I launched our small advertising and social-media-management company nearly 10 years ago. We knew that once we began having children, our willingness to walk away from the steady paychecks of our nine-to-fives would diminish. So we resolved to quit our jobs and put everything we had into starting a company of our own.

Fast-forward a decade and four children later, and we felt our hard work was finally paying off. After years of going without, sleepless nights and 12-hour workdays, things were starting to look up. Three years ago, we reached an important milestone: 100 percent of our income coming from returning clients and referrals. Ditto for the following year. Last year, we were so busy, we were forced to spurn new clients.

We were just starting to get a taste of living the American

Dream.

That all ended the moment the coronavirus wave crashed down on America’s shores. The day after President Trump declared a national emergency, our first client requested to cancel its service agreement with us. The following day, the same request came from two more clients. The following week, we lost our second-biggest client of all.

The hits kept coming, and by last week, nearly half the income my family depends on had evaporated. The fruits of 10 years of blood, sweat and tears were lost in a matter of weeks.

The one thing that made the bitter pill of losing our income easier to swallow was knowing that we were suffering financially in the name of the common good.

I understood that my financial woes were insignificant against the backdrop of so much devastation, and that shuttered businesses meant little compared to the hundreds of thousands of lives lost to COVID-19.

My wife and I were willing to sacrifice our company completely if it really meant we were making a difference. But what’s hardest for me is realizing that all my efforts may have mattered little in the end in places, like the Beehive State, that don’t have the density and international travel links of, say, New York City.

Locking down Gotham may have made sense to “flatten the curve” and prevent the health system from being overwhelmed. But Utah?

It’s now been nearly two weeks since my state’s governor reopened Utah and we moved from a “highrisk” to a “moderate-risk” phase of operations. Malls and restaurants and even our state’s zoo reopened. Last night, my family went out to a movie again for the first time in more than two months.

But instead of seeing a sudden spike in cases and deaths across our state as some expected, we have seen a decline. The Salt Lake Tribune reported on Tuesday that we have had our lowest number of new coronavirus cases in almost a month.

The news made me wonder if Sweden wasn’t right all along.

While its European neighbors closed restaurants, borders and businesses, Sweden went against the grain and elected instead to keep most companies and many schools open while limiting large gatherings and asking the vulnerable to self-isolate.

As CNBC reported, it was a strategy “aimed at allowing some exposure to the virus in order to build immunity among the general population while protecting high-risk groups like the elderly.” The strategy appears to be working, as Sweden’s chief epidemiologist recently said that the population there is expected to reach “herd immunity” this month.

Maybe or maybe not. But at the very least, I can’t help but wonder if a more nuanced approach, taking into account the vast differences among US states, would have been wiser.

Here’s what I know: I can’t sleep at night, as I worry about providing for my family and about starting the past decade all over again. Some folks want this lockdown to last indefinitely. It must be nice not to have to worry about feeding children and keeping a business alive.

Daryl Austin is a small-business owner and a writer.

‘ Locking down Gotham may have made sense to flatten the curve and protect Utah?’ the health system. But