The Boston Globe, our local newspaper, led with a story last month entitled “A warning on relaxing too soon," subtitled “Epidemiologists say take it slow after Baker eases some pandemic restrictions." The article noted that, citing an improvement in the pandemic curve, Massachusetts Governor Baker announced an overnight advisory for residents and that he would relax rules requiring many restaurants to close at 9:30 PM. The article went on to quote several experts about this, all of whom warned that this adjustment came too soon. Tellingly to our mind, one of the experts quoted was “not privy to all the data the Baker administration has and acknowledged that there are economic and psychological factors to consider when it comes to assessing restrictions.”
We could not agree more and argue strongly that fundamentally decisions about societal actions — including around Covid-19 — have to be political decisions that include the science but also must balance a range of other considerations. In the same weekend for example, we saw stories about surges in suicides among school-age children in Las Vegas, resulting in school re-opening, a scenario long anticipated by the CDC. Surely such reports should be a consideration in decisions made to maintain or relax restrictions.
Read the full article on The Turning Point.