4 reasons Conn. still needs emergency powers

It’s still too early to end Gov. Ned Lamont’s emergency powers, though it seems a lifetime since the legislature first granted him sweeping authority to fight the pandemic. Four people still die every day on average from COVID-19 in Connecticut, and hundreds remain hospitalized. The positivity rate is up. There are chilling signs of COVID spreading among children and of an even more transmissible variant popping up.

The governor’s emergency powers end this month. Unless the legislature extends them another three or more months, he’ll be unable to:

Continue requiring that all possible K-12 schoolteachers and early-childhood staff get vaccinated. Why does this matter? Because kids now represent 29 percent of all COVID cases nationwide.

Continue requiring that all possible workers in nursing homes and adult day care centers get vaccinated. Why is this important? Because nearly 3,000 nursing home residents in Connecticut have died from COVID-19.

Continue requiring that all possible state employees get vaccinated. Why bother? Because the coronavirus is sweeping through state prisons, among other places. At least 4,700 offenders have tested positive, and 43 staff are recovering from it.

Continue requiring masks in public K-12 schools. Why make kids mask up? Because 25,000 Connecticut

children have gotten infected. The number of children hospitalized in the U.S. with COVID-19 hit a record high of more than 1,900 cases this past month. And yes, studies prove that masks do protect.

In the 18 months since Lamont began issuing emergency executive orders, he’s never abused his authority. Also, legislative leaders have the power to reject any of his pandemicrelated orders. It’s doubtful the legislature could have passed such life-saving rules quickly, if at all. Plus, legislators have been happy to let the governor take the heat from fringe groups that don’t believe in science.

Now 82 percent of Connecticut residents 12 and up are fully vaccinated — compared with Florida’s 63 percent vaccination rate. In the Sunshine State, deaths are at their highest levels ever — 350 a day on average — in no small part because Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis won’t allow the sort of vaccine and mask requirements that Connecticut has.

Republican legislators argue that Gov. Lamont’s emergency powers are no longer needed. If only that were true.

There were 327 people hospitalized with coronavirus in Connecticut as of Monday, and 72 of them were not fully vaccinated. Imagine how that number would rise if the governor’s vaccine mandates weren’t in place. (See Florida, above.)

It’s true that the governor has had these extraordinary powers a long time, since March 2020. At that time, only 4,291 people worldwide had lost their lives from COVID-19. A year and a half later, 1,000 times that number have died from the disease — 4.6 million people.

Today, the delta variant is now the threat, accounting for 99 percent of Connecticut’s cases. But the mu variant is on the rise. Connecticut has had 73 mu cases as of Sept. 5. “Connecticut has one of the nation’s highest rates of the mu variant,” says Hartford Healthcare.

It’s too soon to relax our guard, and it’s doubtful the legislature could keep in place the policies that are protecting most of us from COVID. Give the governor another three months at least, please.

Today, the delta variant is now the threat, accounting for 99 percent of Connecticut’s cases. But the mu variant is on the rise. Connecticut has had 73 mu cases as of Sept. 5.