Puerto Rico joins 22 states on Chicago’s travel quarantine list
Puerto Rico on Tuesday joined 22 states on Chicago’s 14-day travel quarantine list amid concern about a surge in coronavirus cases among travelers, in households and at social gatherings.
With “more than five dozen confirmed cases” among travelers, Chicago Public Health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady urged Chicagoans to curtail all but the most essential trips and work from home when they return if travel cannot be avoided.
Last week, Arwady added Wisconsin, Missouri, Nebraska and North Dakota to the travel advisory and warned compliance would no longer be voluntary.
This week, Puerto Rico was the only addition, having met the benchmark trigger of averaging more than 15 new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 residents over a seven-day period.
Iowa, Kansas and Utah were identified as fast-improving states that could be removed from the travel order as early as next week.
Arwady also backed off her earlier threat to issue tickets. The Health Department’s limited enforcement resources will not be diverted away from restaurants and bars and toward “aggressive enforcement techniques that we’ve seen in other places and frankly haven’t worked that well,” she said.
“I have absolutely no intention of pulling cars over that have outof-state license plates. I have no intention of developing watchlists of people who are flying in through the airports . ... But where we identify people of concern, we are sending warning letters,” Arwady said.
Chicago’s positivity rate stands at 4.8% with a rolling, seven-day average of 270 new cases a day and 273 new cases Tuesday. Deaths are averaging three a day. Daily hospitalizations are under 10.
That’s a far cry from May, when Chicago was averaging 1,000 cases a day and the “worst day” surged to 1,500 new cases. Back then, daily hospitalizations were averaging 175 and deaths stood at nearly 50 a day.
With the coronavirus “in good control” in workplaces, homeless shelters, long-term care facilities and Cook County Jail, the concern has shifted to households and social gatherings where people “trust each other and let their guard down,” she said.
To drive home the point, Arwady read from a series of case studies in the last week. They include birthday parties, neighbors gathering without masks, dinners with friends and a teenager who hosted a two-day card tournament “with many people coming through the home,” infecting as many as 20 people.
“I know that you feel safe at home . ... I know that you feel safe when you’re among friends that you know. It’s easy to let your guard down. To not wear a mask. To not social distance. But the problem is, as we’re seeing cases increase, the risk is significantly higher and, as people are letting down their guard, they’re out, potentially contracting COVID, and then bringing it back into households,” she said.
Arwady warned again Chicago cases are headed in the wrong direction, primarily driven by a rise among young people between the ages of 18 and 29 and 30 and 39. They are engaging in risky behavior and bringing the virus home with them.