El Paso mayor attributes coronavirus spike to shopping at major retailers

by



[ad_1]

El Paso Mayor Dee Margo (right) attributes the recent spike in Chinese coronavirus cases to people shopping at major retailers in an appearance on CBS News on Sunday. Face the nation.

Monday, the city of El Paso, Texas, reported 461 new cases of Wuhan virus, bringing the cumulative total to 86,172 cases:

On Sunday, the city’s mayor attributed the peak of cases to people suffering from “COVID fatigue”.

“We hit, oh, almost six weeks ago we started to increase dramatically. I think people fair – the consensus is that people just got COVID fatigue and they gave it up, like Dr Birx said, you have to wear the mask and you have to maintain the distance and you have to avoid them. crowds ”. He said, detailing the “deep dive” officials took in their contact tracing for the week of November 10-16.

The survey found that “55% of the positives came from shopping at large retailers, what we would call big box stores,” according to the mayor:

And these are considered essential according to the directives of the CISA within the framework of internal security. And we don’t really – I have no control over the limitations there. We’ve been asking for voluntary limits and Wal-Mart and several others are starting to measure, which means they’re going to limit the occupancy of their – of their stores, which we think – we also found out that before our – 52 percent of our positives were between 20 and 39 years old. Now he is 30 to 50 years old. So we’re just trying to maintain, but recently, and I’m afraid to even mention it, we’ve started to look like we’re maybe starting at a plateau. On Thanksgiving Day we had 406 positives. The next day it was 678.

Margaret Brennan of CBS News asked Margo what other steps he could take given that big box retail stores, which officials say are helping the virus spread, are seen as essential.

“I know you just said you can’t close the big box stores because they are deemed essential,” Brennan said.

“But at some point, because of what you’re talking about, if people don’t take personal responsibility for themselves and their own behavior, do you as the mayor have to shut down all the businesses you can?” she asked.

The mayor explained that he “took action” to close the bars and restaurants at 9 p.m., but Brennan noted that the restaurants, as well as other stores, remain open.

“We saw a lot of rallies there. And so we closed them at 9:00 p.m. for dinner, ”said the mayor.

“The state of Texas allowed the bars to convert to restaurants with food trucks, of sorts – some of them were playing the system a bit, we think, and there were a lot of congregations there. He continued, focusing on private gatherings:

But, you know, when we look at the Rio Grande Valley and Hidalgo County, which peaked just before ours, we spoke to their health department. What they found in their contact research was that the majority of their positives came from home gatherings. And it’s – it’s still problematic here. I mean, we’re – we’re a multigenerational community and the family is big – and there are trips to Mexico. There are also these problems.

Likewise, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) has also placed emphasis on private gatherings, reporting that 65% of all cases are attributable to gatherings of this nature.

“That’s where the spread is coming from. It’s a small gathering. Now we have to communicate that to people like we communicated the masks, ”he said at Monday’s press conference.

“Apparently the safest place – my house, my table, my family. Yeah, even this place is not safe, ”he added.

El Paso made headlines earlier this month on the mobilization of the Texas National Guard, tasked with “supporting[ing] moratorium cases in the region ”:

El Paso County is reportedly moving mobile mortuaries to a “central morgue,” according to ABC7.



[ad_2]

Source link