New York, California and other states plan for reopening as coronavirus
crisis eases
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[April 14, 2020]
By Maria Caspani and Jessica Resnick-Ault
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Ten U.S. governors on
the east and west coasts banded together on Monday in two regional pacts
to coordinate gradual economic reopenings as the coronavirus crisis
finally appeared to be ebbing.
Announcements from the New York-led group of Northeastern governors, and
a similar compact formed by California, Oregon and Washington state,
came as President Donald Trump declared any decision on restarting the
U.S. economy was up to him.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said he was teaming up with five
counterparts in adjacent New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, Pennsylvania
and Rhode Island to devise the best strategies for easing stay-at-home
orders imposed last month to curb coronavirus transmissions.
Massachusetts later said it was joining the East Coast coalition.
"Nobody has been here before, nobody has all the answers," said Cuomo,
whose state has become the U.S. epicenter of the global coronavirus
pandemic, during an open conference call with five other governors.
"Addressing public health and the economy: Which one is first? They're
both first."
The three Pacific Coast states announced they, too, planned to follow a
shared approach for lifting social-distancing measures, but said they
"need to see a decline in the rate of spread of the virus before
large-scale reopening" can take place.
SAFETY AND HEALTH FIRST
The 10 governors, all Democrats except for Charlie Baker of
Massachusetts, gave no timeline for ending social lockdowns that have
idled the vast majority of more than 100 million residents in their
states.
But they stressed that decisions about when and how to reopen
non-essential businesses, along with schools and universities, would put
the health of residents first and rely on science rather than politics.
The announcements came as signs emerged that the crisis had peaked. At
least 1,500 new U.S. fatalities were reported on Monday, below last
week's running tally of roughly 2,000 deaths every 24 hours. Likewise,
the number of additional confirmed cases counted on Monday, about
23,000, was well below last week's trend of 30,000 to 50,000 new cases a
day.
Cuomo, whose state accounts for the largest number of cumulative deaths,
over 10,000, said on Monday "the worst is over" for his state.
Governors of at least two other hard-hit states - John Bel Edwards of
Louisiana and J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, both Democrats - also disputed
the notion that authority to lift or modify their stay-at-home orders
rested with anyone but them.
Pritzker said reopening his state may occur in stages and be accompanied
by new face-covering requirements in public places and workplace
capacity limits. "The most important thing is safety and health," he
said.
Trump, a Republican who before the pandemic had touted a vibrant U.S.
economy as a pillar of his November re-election bid, has pressed
repeatedly in recent weeks for getting Americans back to work soon.
Ahead of the governors' announcement on Monday, he insisted he had
unilateral authority for ending the lockdowns that have strangled the
U.S. economy, throwing at least 17 million Americans out of work in just
three weeks.
Legal experts say the president has limited power under the U.S.
Constitution to order citizens back to their places of employment, to
require cities to reopen government offices and transportation, or to
order local businesses to resume.
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Bloodworks Northwest Phlebotomist Niilo Juntunen takes a blood
donation from Craig McCall of Tacoma, Washington during a Pop-Up
Blood Drive experience at T-Mobile Park, the stadium of Major League
Baseball's Seattle Mariners, as efforts continue to help slow the
spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Seattle, Washington,
U.S. April 13, 2020. REUTERS/Jason Redmond
Pressed on the question of whether governors or the federal
government would make the decision to re-open shuttered schools and
businesses, Trump insisted he had ultimate authority.
"The president of the United States calls the shots," Trump told a
White House briefing after the announcements by the governors,
reiterating a stance he expressed earlier in the day on Twitter.
"With that being said, we're going to work with the states," Trump
told reporters.
"They can't do anything without the approval of the president of the
United States," Trump went on. "When somebody is the president of
the United Sates, the authority is total, and that's the way it's
going to be. ... The governors know that."
He offered no specifics backing his assertion of authority over the
states nor any details of plans to relax social distancing rules.
Political leaders said a reopening of the economy may hinge on more
widespread testing to better determine the full extent of infections
and cautioned that lifting stay-at-home orders prematurely could
reignite the outbreak.
The Trump administration has signaled May 1 as a potential date for
easing the restrictions.
DEATH TOLL TOPS 23,500
The U.S. death toll from COVID-19, the highly infectious lung
disease caused by the virus, topped 23,600 on Monday, out of more
than 581,000 known U.S. infections, according to a Reuters tally.
The United States, with the world's third-largest population by
country, has recorded greater loss of life from COVID-19 than any
other nation.
Wyoming reported its first death from the coronavirus on Monday, the
final U.S. state to report a fatality.
An influential University of Washington research model this week
raised its U.S. mortality forecasts on Monday to nearly 69,000
deaths through Aug. 4, up from 61,500 projected last week, assuming
that social-distancing measures remain in place.
The university's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said
higher death tolls now projected in Massachusetts and New York state
accounted for part of the upward revision.
Regardless of the death toll, continued difficulties in ramping up
diagnostic testing pose a major hurdle for public health experts in
determining at what point it is safe enough to relax social
distancing measures.
New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Oxiris Barbot acknowledged a
"tightening" of the supply chain for the nasal swabs needed in
coronavirus testing, and said it was part of a "national and
international challenge" to ramp up testing.
(Reporting by Maria Caspani and Jessica Resnick-Ault in New York;
Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu and Lisa Lambert in Washington,
Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut, and Dan Whitcomb in Los
Angeles; Writing by Grant McCool; Editing by Bill Tarrant, Cynthia
Osterman, Leslie Adler and Gerry Doyle)
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