Abbott remains silent on omicron threat
As other states are mobilizing to respond to the rapidly spreading omicron variant, Gov. Greg Abbott is not budging on his hands-off approach to the coronavirus pandemic.
In March, Abbott ended his statewide mask mandate, marking the beginning of a sharp shift toward preaching “personal responsibility” and an outright rejection of government mandates — state or local — to curb the pandemic. That philosophy carried the state through the delta variant this fall, even as hospitals were overrun and deaths mounted.
Now, as the state stares down the latest variant, Abbott continues to rule out any mask or vaccine mandates or business shutdowns.
“We’re moving forward with life as we know it,” Abbott said in a radio interview Tuesday when asked about omicron.
Texas has begun to see a rise in some key pandemic metrics, including daily new cases and the positivity rate — the percentage of tests that come back positive for COVID-19. The rate hit 14.6 percent this week, above the 10 percent threshold that Abbott had previously identified as worrisome. Hospitals have not yet seen a notable increase in cases, however.
Abbott’s spokesperson, Renae Eze, said the governor recently was briefed on the state’s response to omicron by John Hellerstedt, commissioner of the Department of State Health Services, and Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management. Eze otherwise gave no indication the state was doing anything differently in response to the variant.
She called vaccination the “best defense” against COVID-19.
Abbott was vaccinated on camera late last year and has encouraged Texans to get their shots. But he does not go out of his way to promote vaccinations and he has expended much more energy fighting efforts by local and federal officials to impose vaccine requirements.
Abbott has been virtually silent on vaccine booster shots, which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says every eligible adult should receive. The word “booster” has never appeared on Abbott’s personal Twitter account, and a spokesperson did not respond when asked whether the governor has received a booster.
As of Monday, 14.4 percent of Texans had gotten booster shots.
State Rep. Chris Turner, chair of the House Democratic Caucus, said Abbott should encourage vaccination “more often and more loudly.”
The Department of State Health Services has been more active in encouraging vaccination, as well as boosters. On social media, it has shared video testimonials from people who were initially reluctant to get the vaccine but ultimately received it.
“With the holidays around the corner and (omicron) spreading, DSHS recommends getting fully vaccinated and a booster shot,” the agency said in a tweet.
President Joe Biden announced Tuesday the federal government would buy half a billion at-home rapid tests to distribute free to Americans. A number of states have extended or declared a state of emergency. And several major cities have announced plans to require proof of vaccination to enter indoor spaces.
There has been no comparable mobilization by Abbott, who has not held a news conference on COVID-19 since March.
Texas’ COVID cases are trending up after the state reported an average of more than 6,000 confirmed cases every day for the last week.
“The case data suggests that we have entered another COVID surge much like we’re seeing around the world with the emergence of omicron,” said Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium. “We’re not yet seeing hospitalizations coming up, but that could follow shortly behind.”
Meyers said there is still “a lot of uncertainty” about what impact
omicron will have in Texas, particularly when it comes to the severity of cases. But given the rising case numbers, “if ever there was a time to err on the side of caution, now is the time,” she said.
Politically, Abbott is in a different situation than the last time Texas dealt with a rise in cases. He now has a serious Democratic challenger in Beto O’rourke.
O’rourke has said he would allow schools and businesses to require masks and vaccines. At the same time, he has suggested taking an understanding approach to those resistant to the vaccine, saying they should not be judged because
it “pushes them into a corner.”
On his right, Abbott faces pressure to do less, not more, to fight the pandemic. When it comes to vaccine requirements, dozens of Republican state lawmakers believe he has not done enough to prevent them. They want him to call a special session of the Legislature to codify his executive order forbidding local mandates.