For businesses out there still closed under Gov. Charlie Baker’s March 24 shutdown order, we feel your pain.
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For businesses out there still closed under Gov. Charlie Baker’s March 24 shutdown order, we feel your pain. Nearly all businesses and residents seemed on board three months ago to put the economy in a coma to stem the spread of the coronavirus, but as offices, restaurants, retailers, manufacturers and hotels have reopened under the first two phases of Baker’s plan, it is tough for those Phase Three and Four businesses like fitness clubs, bars and large venues who must wait weeks or months to begin to find their new normal.Right now, they are shouldering the bulk of the responsibility in keeping the coronavirus at bay. But it is necessary.
Based on the numbers, Baker’s plan has worked. Even as the U.S. is reporting record numbers of daily cases, the number of new COVID-19 positives in Massachusetts is falling. Worcester County went without a reported coronavirus-related death for the first time in three months on June 27, and Massachusetts did the same three days later. What was a scary and unpredictable pandemic seems slightly more manageable now, as the world waits for a vaccine and strives for herd immunity, when the economy can finally go back to full throttle.
The outbreaks happening right now in Florida, Texas and Arizona are clear evidence of the problems caused by reopening the economy too early. Each of those states now has to roll back their plans, again asking businesses to shutter. To once again get our businesses open and Central Massachusetts residents employed, we can’t be forced to shut down our economy. Our hospitals can’t be overwhelmed with coronavirus patients, and a previously unimaginable death toll can’t be allowed to cause permanent emotional and economic scars.
Don’t be like David Blondin, the owner of Prime Fitness Gym in Oxford, who so defiantly reopened his business during the worst of the Massachusetts COVID-19 hospitalization that the town had to be forced to cut off his water and electricity. That type of reckless will only get more people killed and end up causing long-term economic harm. Fitness centers can easily become super spreaders of the coronavirus, and they need to have proper sanitation policies and social distancing efforts in order to reopen. Any business owner running defiantly against the recommendation of health officials – for whatever reason – is selfishly dragging down the entire community.
None of this has been easy. Baker, in being overly cautious, appears to have likely saved lives and put the economy back on track toward a smart and total reopening, even if it did cause significant economic harm over the last three months. We’re not through the coronavirus pandemic, by a long shot, so it is important we all remain vigilant and play our role.
