Editorial: We have been patient. But Gov. Pritzker is moving the goal posts.
By The Editorial Board
Chicago Tribune |
May 06, 2020 | 7:47 PM
After nearly seven weeks of battling COVID-19 while enduring economic and emotional hardship, it’s reasonable for Illinoisans to ask whether the goals of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s stay-at-home order are being met. Or, to put it in terms every anxious resident feels: When can the state reopen and life begin to resemble normal?
People are dying of the coronavirus, but many lives are being saved. That’s because everyday activities have been suspended or curtailed, and people are taking this pandemic seriously while practicing social distancing. The rate of infection has slowed enough to allow hospitals here to manage caseloads. That’s what success was supposed to look like. Illinois is, indeed, bending the curve on an escalating health pandemic we feared could overwhelm hospital resources.
The costs of that success are enormous; the burdens are excruciating for many. Closed businesses, closed schoolhouses, closed churches. Family and friends cut off from one another. Many people trapped at home in isolation. Illinois cannot remain shut down indefinitely. Neither can the country. On Friday, economists expect the U.S. Labor Department to report that April unemployment hit an astounding 16%. That’s 22 million jobs lost in one month, the equivalent of eliminating every job created in the past decade, The Wall Street Journal reported.
This week, with about four weeks to go until the current May 30 expiration of the stay-at-home edict, Pritzker set out a five-phase schedule to reopen Illinois. The state currently is in Phase 2. The governor’s caution in enforcing stay-at-home orders has been working to keep health care facilities underwhelmed. But he is now facing growing pressure, especially from less-populated downstate communities, to ease up.
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