In a pandemic year that has killed more than 7,500 South Carolinaians and more than half a million Americans, we are making extraordinary progress in recovering our lives from COVID-19.
More than 15% of the United States’ population has been vaccinated, and more people receive their vaccines daily. Add them to almost 10% of the population that tested positive – with estimates of four or five times more infected – and we will be significantly reducing the number of available hosts that can spread the virus to others, including others whose bodies are not strong enough to survive an infection.
In states like South Carolina, which prioritized people most vulnerable to serious infections and death over those most likely to be exposed to coronavirus, we are beginning to see more older residents venturing out of the self-imposed quarantine to resume a style. more normal life.
But while all of this is cause for celebration, it is no reason to let our guard down – mainly because a dramatic drop in new infections from late January appears to be stabilizing as new variants of COVID spread.
On Friday, we received a double dose of warning from the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Rochelle Walenski, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who warned against the temptation to cut public health care, because the nation it remains “in that very precarious position we were in before the falling wave – where anything that might disturb us could give us another wave.”
Unfortunately, the other thing that happened on Friday was that SC Governor Henry McMaster did exactly what Drs. Walenski and Fauci warned against, once again jumping the gun and easing their restrictions as we started to move in the right direction, but long before we were in a safe place. After all, South Carolina still had the second highest number of new infections per 100,000 people in the country last week.
There may not be much of a practical effect from McMaster’s decision to suspend the 11pm curfew on alcohol sales. The curfew has never been more effective than the ban on meeting in bars, which he should have maintained in the fall, when he eliminated the demands for social distance in restaurants and bars. Instead, he replaced that very clever restriction with the alcohol curfew, thereby encouraging university bars to reopen and pack the parties that spread COVID.
And certainly removing the theoretical restriction on large agglomerations is unlikely to make South Carolina an even more fertile ground for infections. As we explained last month, if you are serious about protecting public health, you do not assign the Department of Commerce to protecting public health. The department rarely refused registrations for events with more than 250 people, and why is that? The barrier was not too high to get approved, and there was no application when the rules were blatantly disrespected – even when the off-duty police were working on the events – so everyone who didn’t want to clean the bar had to lie about their plans.
But while McMaster’s latest setback in public health requirements may not have much of a practical effect, it sends an insidious message that the danger is behind us. Yes, the governor made it clear that it is still dangerous and we all need to remain cautious, but most people will simply see the news of “lifting restrictions” and ignore his words.
So think of it as an exclamation point in the governor’s responsible words: Yes, the virus is still alive and well in our communities and is still sick and killing our most vulnerable friends and neighbors. And the only way to save them and get our economy and our lives back to normal, is to get our vaccinations as soon as possible, stay at home as long as we can, wear our masks and stay as far away from others when possible go out, and wash your hands and clean surfaces compulsively.
It should also be noted that, by eliminating the requirements because many of the most vulnerable Southern Carolinians were vaccinated, Mr. McMaster undermined his argument against allowing teachers to go ahead and get in line now for a vaccine, before all people 65 years or older have been scheduled for a vaccination. If a sufficient number of elderly residents have already been vaccinated to make it safe to remove restrictions aimed at protecting them, slowing the spread across the community, then how possibly is it too dangerous to start vaccinating teachers – which removes the exaggerated objections to bringing children back to the classroom five days a week?