Alabama was never going to magically reopen when Lt. Governor Will Ainsworth unveiled his plan to get Alabama back to work. It was always a recommendation.
President Donald Trump and his team have laid out a series of plans for governors to look at and develop ways to get their states open.
Guess what — we aren’t there yet.
Trump’s plan, that has the backing of his public health officials, Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx, calls for a state to show a steady 14-day decline in the number of cases a state is seeing.
Alabama is not there yet.
That data shows us on a clear seven-day average decline over the last six days.
Is that confusing? Yes. It means that using data from the last 13 days, we are declining in new cases quickly.
This is good.
People will scream that “we don’t have testing,” but that’s not true. More testing is being manufactured and delivered every day.
These comments are from people who aren’t in the know and are just repeating what they hear on cable news. That is also true for a lot of the local media in this state, as well.
But there is more positive data out there.
Today was the day the latest The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation projection had us hitting our peak in deaths and resource use in Alabama three days ago, meaning we are declining on that front, too.
Keep in mind, we had absurd projections of 25,000 dead in Alabama at one point.
Data is one thing, facts are another. Huntsville Hosptial CEO David Spiller’s comments show this trend is already looking good.
Interesting numbers from Huntsville Hospital CEO David Spillers. Huntsville Hospital currently has one patient on a ventilator because of COVID-19. They have 55 patients on ventilators for other conditions not related to COVID-19.
— Robert_Aderholt (@Robert_Aderholt) April 20, 2020
The point is we are almost home.
This state needs to know that we are nearing the end of this pandemic and the start of reopening the economy.
What we don’t need is this kind of silliness with less than 10 people protesting for the state to be reopened now outside of the Madison County Courthouse today.
This included a call for the firing of Dr. Fauci, which seems misplaced and harms the message. Hey, at least they kept the Confederate soldier statue out of the shot.
If I am Governor Kay Ivey, or any other elected official, I look at this and think it validates my view that it’s not time yet, and most people agree.
But it is time for Ivey to lay out a plan to the people of this state for how we will open up moving forward. The sooner she lays that out the better, and once she does, people will be able to calm down.
Dale Jackson is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts a talk show from 7-11 AMweekdays on WVNN.
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