State was doing well, then it ignored reality

It was going so well. We were successfully flattening the curve and preventing the coronavirus from devastating the state. I, a lifelong Democrat, was pleased with Gov. Hutchinson’s management of the crisis and agreed there was really no need for a lockdown order.

Then, monied interests and the right wing of the Republican Party weighed in to demand that the economy be reopened, despite the fact that Arkansas met none of the CDC guidelines for doing so. It isn’t that the economy isn’t a problem. It’s a huge problem. But here we are. Covid-19 cases have exploded and we are faceto-face with a full-blown epidemic that will bring us to our knees and the economy with it. It saddens me to see Gov. Hutchinson and Dr. Nate Smith perform verbal backflips at their daily briefing to justify continuing the opening in the face of clear evidence that it is unwise to do so. Increased testing may account for some of the number of infections, but has no effect on the number of hospitalizations and deaths.

Clearly, the powers that be have decided we are going to reopen the economy, and if a few people have to die to get that done, so be it. After all, it will be mostly old folks and poor people of color, so who cares? This will not end well. We do not have the testing and contact tracing capacity to get ahead of this epidemic and achieve a measure of control. People are not exercising proper distancing or wearing masks when they are in public places. They are gathering in crowds that guarantee easy transmission of the virus. This fall will be awful because we will experience the full force of the pandemic at the same time flu season is upon us. The healthcare system will be overwhelmed and we may witness the re-emergence of dead wagons roaming the streets to collect the dead, as they did during the Black Death of the Middle Ages.

I can only hope that I am wrong, because I am in my early 70s, diabetic and an asthmatic former smoker. I am in the crosshairs of this disease.

STEVEN IMHOFF Fayetteville