Advertising
Supported by
Is it imaginable to stabilize coronavirus infections without going into a full blockage? The maximum affected states of the solar belt offer a real-time experience.
By Sarah Mervosh and Simon Romero
While the United States exceeds 4 million known cases of coronavirus, far more than any other country, the new epidemics are sending thousands of people critically to hospitals and provoking a new wave of funerals. But there are also initial symptoms that new infections would possibly stabilize in some places, adding some of the worst hot spots.
This would possibly be the visual maxim in Arizona.
Just a few weeks ago, Arizona led the country in relation to coronavirus cap infections, as the virus spread to many Sun Belt states that opened last spring. Faced with a developing crisis in June, Governor Doug Ducey, a Republican, backtracked and allowed cities and counties to order citizens to wear masks. He also canceled some past reopenings and ordered the closure of bars, indoor gyms, water parks and cinemas.
About a month later, the number of patients hospitalized with the virus begins to decline. On Friday afternoon, Arizona was the only state where the new known daily instances were declining, a milestone that reflected, in part, how disastrous the situations had been.
“It’s imaginable in a month to really start replacing things. We saw it in March and April,” said Dr. Tom Inglesby, director of the Center for Health Safety at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The question now is whether it is possible to do so while avoiding another total blockade, and states like Arizona will offer a real-time experience.
“Somehow, it’s like a full-scale edition of a clinical trial,” Dr. Inglesby said. “Arizona is one of the affected states and is going through a crisis and is now taking a safe set of interventions, and we’re seeing if those interventions work.”
Arizona has been discussed at the same time as Florida and Texas, after the 3 states experienced alarming expansion rates this summer, causing the worst of the Sun Belt epidemic. All states are led by a Republican governor who issued orders to stay home in the spring and withstood the entire shutdown when the virus later came into effect. Instead, states have followed a specific approach, combining bar constraints with mask requirements, either locally or statewide.
Texas and Florida also see mild symptoms of improvement, each having an average of more than 9,000 new cases shown consistent with the day and have hot spots with the highest hospitalization rates.
Advertising