Friends, the news on the COVID front is simply not good. 437 tested positive yesterday - 364 the day before that - 352 the day before that. Two weeks ago those numbers were around 115 per day; a month ago the numbers were in the 60s and 70s. Our active case number as of today is 3,297; we haven’t seen that since early May. BTW that’s a jump in active cases of over 1,000 since this past Monday.
We just filed a countywide robocall with a public reminder of the personal steps we must take: masks, hand washing, social distancing. We’re going to return to reporting at 2pm twice weekly again, Mondays and Thursdays. We’re now setting up PPE giveaways at apartment complexes to get the protection down to the grassroots level. We’re going to ratchet back our County department staffs to remote work as much as possible. Only virtual meetings for our Boards and Commissions immediately, no in-person gatherings.
Governor Cuomo holds executive authority to effect the how's and when's of shutdowns. We don’t want to see anything shutdown per se, but if we don’t turn the corner soon....choices may be limited. We expect he will work in harmony with neighboring Governors. I know all too well the terrible economic impacts of any shutdowns and it is devastating to lives. All the more reason to stop any need for shutdowns by getting 100% compliance on social gatherings, masks, etc.
We prize our personal freedom and we speak of personal responsibility. The price of doing our own thing could well be the lives of a neighbor or family member. If we step up as individuals, then there’s no need for government to step in. But lives are at stake. Arguing over death statistics, dialogue that tries to minimize the threat we face sounds more like fighting to avoid the self sacrifice that is needed in this revived moment of the pandemic.
We were warned of this. And it has come true. How we respond to this is really the only question now.
Westchester County Executive George Latimer
No comments:
Post a Comment