Reopening panel has sent reports to Baker

Photo | SHNS Gov. Charlie Baker

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By State House News Service

The advisory board figuring out how Massachusetts businesses might be able to reopen has already filed interim reports with the governor and is expected to make additional suggestions ahead of its May 18 deadline, Gov. Charlie Baker said Wednesday, though the governor also further elaborated on what conditions must be met before he will allow businesses to reopen.

Speaking outside Gillette Stadium after swearing in the latest class of Massachusetts State Police recruits, Baker said "the trends over the course of the last six to eight days have been reasonably positive" but added that the data still does not support a reopening of the economy.

"We're still very much in this fight with COVID-19, but it is encouraging to see some positive progress. As we come through the other side of this and determine our next steps for a path forward, we need to see those numbers continue to drop," he said. "Our goal, starting on May 18, is to begin re-opening certain types of businesses in a limited fashion where it can be done more safely than under normal operations. But this phased-in process can't begin until we see sustained downward trends in many of the data elements that we talk about every day."

Baker said the reopening panel led by Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito and Economic Development Secretary Mike Kennealy has already "made several" reports on potential strategies. "They're planning to make what I would describe as interim reports along the way here between now and the 18th, absolutely," he said.

The governor has already eased some restrictions in order to allow employees of non-essential businesses to return to their locked workplaces to facilitate online orders, deliveries and the like. On Wednesday morning, the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce said the Baker administration should announce its phased economic re-opening plan by this Friday to give employers and workers at least 10 days to prepare for a potential reawakening of activity.

The governor pointed out Wednesday that the percentage of tests that result in positive cases has consistently been lower than it was last month and that hospitalizations have been flat or slightly declining over the last week. But, he said, many hospitals are still operating under their surge plans -- the steps taken to boost capacity at hospitals and through field hospitals to prepare for an influx of COVID-19 patients -- and he wants to see the hospitals return to something closer to normal before restarting the economy.

"Right now, a significant number of hospitals are still very much relying on these temporary spaces and beds. We need to have more and more patients recovering and moving out of hospital level care so that hospitals can return to what we would describe as a more normal level of activity," Baker said. "The phased reopening where only certain industries begin to reopen that we're planning for now can't move forward until we see progress on surge capacity, among some of those other elements. And as I said, the virus is still very much challenging our health care system."

As of Tuesday, there were 3,542 people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Massachusetts and the number of people hospitalized has stubbornly hovered between 3,485 and 3,965 for more than three weeks. The number of hospitalized patients has declined in six of the last eight days.

Asked Wednesday about field hospitals in parts of the state that seen COVID-19 activity die down a bit, like Western Mass. and Cape Cod, Baker said, "I think you'll likely see some decisions made over the course of the next several days if, in fact, the trends we've seen so far continue with respect to some of that ancillary capacity that we developed."

Baker cautioned, as he has been doing for about two weeks now, that a few days of encouraging signs from the data is not enough to draw conclusions about the virus or how the pandemic will play out.

"It's very risky to make broad prognostications about what's going on, where it's going, how it's going to get there. So much of what we know about this virus has changed in the last 60 days. Some people might even say that everything we know about this virus has changed in the last 60 days. So when I say here that we have seen encouraging trends, that's because I'm talking about the past," he said. "I'm not going to speak to the future. The future is going to be what it's going to be."