The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Some states order lockdowns, others resist
The governors of Oregon and New Mexico ordered near-lockdowns Friday in response to the wave of infections.
The governors of Oregon and New Mexico ordered near-lockdowns Friday in the most aggressive response yet to the latest wave of coronavirus infections shattering records across the U.S., even as many of their counterparts in other states show little appetite for reimposing the hard-line restrictions of last spring.
“We are in a life- or- death situation, and if we don’t act right now, we cannot preserve the lives, we can’t keep saving lives, and we will absolutely crush our current health care system and infrastructure,” Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico said in imposing a two-week stay-athome order.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a two-week “freeze” starting Wednesday under which all businesses will be required to close their offices to the public and mandate work-from-home “to the greatest extent possible.”
While most Oregon stores will remain open, gyms, museums, pools, movie theaters and zoos will be forced to close, and restaurants and bars will be limited to takeout. Social gatherings will be restricted to six people.
The Democratic governor warned that violators could face fines or arrest.
“For the last eight months I have been asking Oregonians to follow to the letter and the spirit of the law and we have not chosen to engage law enforcement,” Brown said. “At this point in time, ...we have no other option.”
Both states had lockdowns earlier in the year, but the coronavirus is coming back with a vengeance across the country, and the U. S. is facing a long, dark winter. The scourge is blamed for 10.6 million confirmed infections and almost a quarter-million deaths in the U.S., with the closely watched University of Washington model projecting nearly 439,000 dead by March 1.
Deaths have climbed to about 1,000 a day on average. Newcases per day are soaring, reaching another all-time high on Thursday of more than 153,000. Hospitals are getting swamped.
Still, there is little will among many governors and other elected officials for going back to the kind of lockdowns and largescale business closings seen last spring. Some governors also continue to resist issuing statewide mask rules.
Among the reasons given: public fatigue, fear of doing more damage to already- crippled businesses, lack of support from Washington, and the way efforts to tame the virus have become fiercely politicized.
“I think that governors and mayors are, again, in a really tough spot,” Dr. Megan Ranney, an emergency physician and professor at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.
Governors in many states, such as New York, Maryland, Virginia and Minnesota, have instead taken largely incremental measures over the past few days, such as restricting the size of gatherings, making businesses close early, restricting capacity or cutting off alcohol sales earlier in the evening.
Other governors have likewise relied on local and county officials to tackle the crisis, creating a patchwork quilt of restrictions around the country. But that strategy has its limits against a virus.
Experts have argued, too, that strict but relatively short lockdowns could ultimately result in less economic pain than the halfmeasures employed now, which have only succeeded in dragging out the crisis.