The state of Florida has bent to widespread pressure from Washington and beyond to order all residents to stay at home, as cases of coronavirus have soared there.
It had been a rough week for Republican Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor and fervent Donald Trump ally who shares the president’s reluctance to use widespread lockdowns as a tool to help contain coronavirus.
Despite growing pressure from scientists, health officials and political opponents to follow other governors’ leads in shutting down their states entirely, except for essential movements, DeSantis had opted for a piecemeal balance: partial closure in some areas, controversially allowing beaches to remain open and letting cities and counties set their own rules.
But moments ago the state abandoned its piecemeal efforts and ordered a statewide stay home order.
With 6,741 cases and 85 deaths reported statewide by Wednesday morning, some were concerned that DeSantis’s patchwork of policies would lead to far deadlier consequences than elsewhere – especially with more than 20 percent of the state’s population aged 65 or older.
“I’ve called upon the governor to shut down the state. We all stay home, we all do this together,” said Nikki Fried, Florida’s agricultural commissioner and state’s highest elected Democratic official.
“I’d rather take our approach and save lives because, if he is wrong, the devastation on our state will be felt for a generation. His approach, if it fails, is going to cost lives. I hope I’m wrong, but hope isn’t a policy.”
Opposition to DeSantis’s handling of the coronavirus emergency in Florida had become increasingly vocal in a faltering week that began with the governor banning a reporter from an important press briefing then saw him having to correct himself over a stay-at-home order issued for four of the state’s 67 counties.
On Wednesday morning, US surgeon general Jerome Adams said the federal government’s guidelines for a 30-day social distancing should be taken as an effective stay-home order for the nation.
