As states across the country approach the back half of stay-at-home orders – and as many report better-than-expected case counts and death totals – there’s new momentum for Americans to return to work. The president has formed a task force designed to reopen parts of the economy as early as May 1. Some of his advisers don’t even want to wait that long, and “reopen” movements are popping up across the country, including in North Carolina, where a group with more than 22,000 supporters wants Gov. Roy Cooper to let people go back to work at the end of April.
It’s a bad idea. Let’s make plain what will happen if the nation’s governors – who despite Donald Trump’s assertions get to make this call – were to follow that advice:
If we try to go back to normal too quickly, more people will die.
If we decide too soon that our national and local economies have to be rescued, people will die and those economies will suffer.