For the sake of celebrations to come
In 1776, John Adams hoped this day, July 2, would be “celebrated, by succeeding generations, as the great anniversary festival” with “pomp and parade, with shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other.” Here’s hoping that when this weekend’s Independence Day celebrations are over, Adams will have gotten more than the date wrong.
This Fourth of July, sadly, is no time for festivals, parades or shews, other than the Netflix variety. With the coronavirus pandemic resurgent in California and across much of the West and South, lives depend on our collective will to suppress our penchant for gathering, particularly on holidays.
Otherwise joyous holidays and other festivities are a documented danger during pandemics, tempting families and friends to get together and take up old traditions and habits. Some of the current acceleration of infections has been traced to gatherings around Memorial Day. The Lunar New Year holiday in China and Mardi Gras in New Orleans are believed to have accelerated the contagion in January and February. During the 1918 flu pandemic, a parade to support the war effort in Philadelphia and celebrations of the armistice in San Francisco preceded waves of new infections.
With more than twice as many confirmed COVID19 deaths as any other country and new infections again rising sharply, the United States is still the epicenter of the pandemic. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told lawmakers this week that the current rate of more than 40,000 new cases a day could reach 100,000 without changes.
The Bay Area and California, meanwhile, this week recorded their two highest daily totals of new infections as the state’s death toll passed 6,000. Other signs point to a mounting outbreak, not just better detection through increased testing. The share of tests yielding positive results is also creeping upward, from 4.4% two weeks ago to 5.9% this week. And in the most troubling signal of the toll to come, coronavirusrelated hospitalizations have climbed 43% statewide and 49% in San Francisco in that period.
After weeks of hastily reopening the economy, threatening to undo the state’s early success in stemming infections, Gov. Gavin Newsom has imposed an escalating series of measures to slow the contagion. He issued a statewide mask mandate on June 18, ordered or urged bars in 15 counties to close or remain closed on Monday, and, on Wednesday, ordered restaurant dining and several other indoor activities to cease in 19 counties, including Santa Clara, Contra Costa and Solano. Local orders have also reversed planned or implemented reopenings of highrisk businesses such as bars, gyms and salons in the region.
These measures should send a signal that Californians must redouble their efforts to eschew gatherings outside their households. A smaller and quieter celebration of the nation’s birth will ensure that more Americans are here for the next one.
Judging by the nightly sounds of San Francisco, Oakland and other cities across America in recent weeks, however, the fireworks, albeit unsanctioned, are still on. Just don’t get too close to them — or each other.