New York City is ready. With zero deaths reported in the five boroughs on Monday, and just four on Tuesday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio don’t have a good excuse to prolong the blockade any longer.
It is time to reopen everything.
Yes, the death figures are preliminary; An early report citing zero COVID deaths on July 11 was later revised to show 13 deaths, and Monday’s number could still change.
But the state-wide daily death rate has been below 50 almost every day for several weeks and at least close to zero in the past two. In fact, the progress has been so dramatic that Cuomo can’t help but brag about it.
However, he refuses to go the distance: a full Phase Four, where almost everything is open, and New Yorkers are trusted to take precautions to avoid a resurgence of COVID cases.
That was supposed to happen on Monday, and last week, the government again slapped him on the back: “There are no more phases,” he boasted. I should have followed up with: I cheated on you!
It turns out that much of the economy remains closed in Cuomo’s revised Phase Four, which includes parts of key importance to the city: theaters, museums, indoor restaurants. . .
Furthermore, the government is imposing strange new restrictions on bars. Tuesday’s new guide from the State Liquor Authority requires anyone who drinks to order food, too: French fries and cookies aren’t enough, but the cake will do.
Worse yet, it is unclear what the next steps will be or when they will come: “We are in no man’s land,” says Andrew Rigie, head of the New York City Hospitality Alliance. “No one knows when we can reopen and what the metrics are.”
Yes, the virus is clearly on the rise in other states. But the city can employ social distancing, mandatory masks, and other measures to contain the virus. As Johnny Oleksinski of The Post showed on Wednesday, theaters can easily be safely reopened.
This represents paralysis and laziness on the part of the government. Instead of giving specific guidelines to companies, such as how indoor powering might work, our “leaders” simply leave us in a state of limbo and further harm the economy.
Several reports this week from the Citizen Budget Commission, the Association for the City of New York and more highlight the huge economic cost of the blockade. That is also a matter of life and death.
Whatever happens, the city has a long way to go. You need to start to recover faster or the way back will grow even more.
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