President Donald Trump, who famously refused to issue a nationwide stay-at-home order during this ongoing coronavirus outbreak, now says he will decide when orders issued by the states will end.
Arkansas doesn’t have an all-encompassing stay-at-home order in place, but the state is operating under several targeted orders that limit the size of indoor gatherings and shut down or restrict many businesses and activities.
Presumably, Trump expects to decide when any such orders end.
The president’s clear interest is in restarting the nation’s economy as soon as possible.
He first proposed filling the churches on Easter to get back to normalcy. With disease still raging, wiser heads prevailed upon him to back off the idea.
Now, Trump seems bound and determined to “open the country” by May 1.
There’s no question a lot of people would like to see that happen, particularly those who have been put out of work or are watching their businesses decline. There is little people who have been economically stressed would like better than to get back to work and to see their customers and clients return.
Unless, of course, they prefer to guard their health.
Who doesn’t want to avoid this horrendous covid-19 and to protect their families, friends and others from it?
Maybe people are, after all, willing to stay home a while longer, to keep their distance from others, to wear those masks when they are out. Maybe they will wait for the testing that will tell the scientists when the right time is to ease off the restrictions.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, perhaps the nation’s most trusted scientist, said this week that, whenever restrictions ease, another wave of infections will follow.
“That is just reality,” he said.
The country’s top infectious disease expert nonetheless said that there could be a “rolling reentry” in parts of the country as early as next month. But Fauci conditioned that potentiality on the availability of rapid, widespread testing to identify and isolate those who may carry the virus.
Testing is increasing, both for the virus itself and for antibodies in those who have recovered from it, but the tests are hardly widespread. In all of Arkansas, just over 21,000 have been tested for covid-19.
No matter, says Trump, who has discounted the need for more widespread testing and will doubtlessly argue his point to the panel of economic and political advisers and Trump family members he’s appointed to advise him on the timing to reopen America.
Oh, he claims he’s listening to Fauci, too, but it sure is hard to believe he is.
Fortunately, the reopening of America seems not to be in Trump’s control.
Those many orders from the states apparently will stand, even after the social-distancing guidelines issued by Trump expire. The state orders have the force of law. Federal “guidelines” do not. What’s more, a number of states are now joining together to set their own plans to reopen regions of the country, based on their collective judgment of when the timing will be best for them.
One group includes New York and New Jersey, where covid-19 has hit so terribly hard, as well as adjacent states in the region. Another group of West Coast states, led by California, is also organizing to act regionally.
Collectively, they represent a huge chunk of the U.S. economy as well as many of the Americans still being infected by covid-19.
Their governors, notably New York’s Andrew Cuomo and California’s Gavin Newsom, have been in the forefront of the covid-19 fight.
Many of their efforts to recruit Trump’s help on everything from more and quicker testing to medical equipment and supplies have gone unanswered. The president has not won their confidence, certainly not when it comes to this critical decision of when to pull back on social-distancing and send people back to work. “Any plan to reopen society must be driven by data and experts, not opinion and politics,” Cuomo said as he announced formation of that regional alliance.
The governors of California, Oregon and Washington similarly said, in a joint statement, that their residents’ health comes first.
“Health outcomes and science — not politics — will guide these decisions,” the West Coast governors said.
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson has indicated he, too, will be guided by science in determining this state’s post-peak response, naming a panel of physicians chaired by the secretary of the state Health Department to advise him.
The president may think he has the final say on when protective measures will ease in this country. The governors are telling him to think again.
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Brenda Blagg is a freelance columnist and longtime journalist in Northwest Arkansas. Email her at [email protected] .