Hours before Kemp took action, his Alabama Republican counterpart, Gov. Kay Ivey, announced a state-wide mask requirement that will go into effect Thursday. Meanwhile, Walmart and Sam’s Club said they would require buyers to start wearing masks on Monday.
Also Wednesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced on Twitter that New York will send 7,500 COVID-19 test kits, 30,000 pieces of personal protective equipment and 1,250 gallons of hand sanitizer to Atlanta on Friday. Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, who earlier this week sought help from the state amid a growing dispute with Kemp, said she was grateful.
“My mother often says, ‘A friend in need is a friend,'” she tweeted.
Georgia reported 3,871 new cases of the disease on Wednesday, the second highest daily count to date, and 37 deaths. So far, 127,834 people have tested positive for COVID-19 in Georgia, more than double the number reported in mid-June, and 3,091 have died from it in Peach State.
The rate of new tests that are positive for the disease is increasing, an indication experts say suggests that the spread of the disease, and not the increase in evidence, is to blame. During the week of May 24, state public health officials reported that the rate of positive results was approximately 6% over the course of seven days. Last week, the positivity rate was above 13%, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis of state data shows.
Even though the new wave of COVID-19 patients tends to be younger and less ill, they are rapidly filling hospital beds. Hospitalizations exceeded Georgia’s previous peak in April after the July 4 weekend. Critical care open bed actions in the regions surrounding Athens, Dublin, Macon, Marietta, Savannah and Tifton have been dipped in single digits. There was only one left in Dublin, according to the most recent figures available.
Disease experts at Georgia Tech and elsewhere have warned that Georgia is running out of time to avoid the surge in cases that have overwhelmed hospitals in Florida, Arizona and other states that ease restrictions. This month, more than 1,400 healthcare workers signed an open letter asking Kemp to close bars and restaurants, ban indoor gatherings of more than 25 people, demand masks, and free local governments to institute their own rules for stop the spread of the situation. disease.
“It is not too late to get back to basics: mandatory masks, more restrictions on social distancing, freeing mayors to control their local epidemics and greatly expanding testing and contact tracing,” Dr. Melanie Thompson, Principal Investigator, Consortium of AIDS Research. from Atlanta said last week. “These are basic, but we haven’t mastered them yet.”
Dr. Harry J. Heiman, an associate clinical professor at the Georgia State University School of Public Health, said: “In the absence of aggressive action, it will only get worse.”
AJC Staff Writer Greg Bluestein contributed to this article.
