North Carolina is extending Phase 2 of the state’s COVID-19 reopening plans for five more weeks, Gov. Roy Cooper announced Wednesday.
This means nightclubs and bars that operate as “private clubs” under state alcohol laws, bowling alleys, skating rinks, movie theaters and some other places that people congregate must remain closed to reduce the spread of the coronavirus. Owners had hoped to get back into operation on Friday when an executive order keeping them closed was set to expire.
These businesses have been shut since March.
Cooper’s decision comes as North Carolina’s COVID-19 hospitalization rates appear to have leveled off and the infection report statistics have stabilized or started to fall but remain higher than state health officials prefer. And it comes as schools and colleges are starting to reopen, creating potential for infections to rise again as students are around each other and teachers and staff.
“As I said last week, stable is good, but decreasing is better,” Cooper said during a news conference. “And while we are seeing stabilization of our numbers, that doesn’t mean we can let up. We know this stability is fragile, and these trends can change quickly if we let down our guards.”
Hospitals in other states were beaten when his COVID closures rose faster, Cooper said, and he needs a similar scenario here that can lead to more ailments and deaths.
On Wednesday, North Carolina recorded 2,050 COVID-19 deaths and hospitalized 1,167 others, according to the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.
The state as of Wednesday has had 129,288 lab-confirmed cases of people with the coronavirus, and as of Monday, it had 105,093 presumed recoveries from the disease.
The owners of shuttered bars and other businesses have questioned why they have to stay closed while others — craft brew pubs that manufacture their beer on site, for example, and restaurants that serve alcohol — have been allowed to open and allow the public inside.
Cooper on Wednesday defended his policy as a tool to slow the spread of the virus and drive down the infection rates.
“There is a difference in in that these were made, the products were made on site, and in addition, the small number of those craft breweries and wineries presented a strong plan of public safety to the Department of Health and Human Services, to the point that the experts believed that that would work,” the governor said.
Other states reopened bars to their detriment, Cooper noted.
“We know they’re high-transmission areas and that’s why they’ve remained closed,” he said.
Cooper said he recently instituted an 11 p.m. curfew on alcohol sales in restaurants “because we were getting information about restaurants turning into bars after hours.”
The closure is extended another five weeks instead of a shorter period such as two or three weeks, Cooper said, because “we want to make sure what is happening with our numbers with schools reopening over the next several weeks.”
Paul Woolverton can be reached at [email protected] and 910-261-4710.
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