Recent editorials of statewide and national interest from Pennsylvania’s newspapers:
Maintain vigilance for environment
The Citizens’ Voice
April 22
The Trump administration rolled out an infamously slow response to the COVID-19 pandemic, but wasted no time in trying it to use it as an excuse to diminish environmental regulation.
Last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a “temporary enforcement discretion policy.” The agency will not penalize polluters for failing to comply with monitoring and reporting rules if the agency agrees with a company’s claim that the failure is the result of the pandemic. This administration’s well-documented animosity toward environmental regulation will make that a very easy sell. In other words, the EPA is prepared to look the other way while inviting polluters to blamed regulatory violations on the public health crisis.
That posture is all the more galling regarding air pollution, which triggers asthma and, therefore, increases the risk for asthma sufferers exposed to the virus.
It’s not clear why the EPA thinks the pandemic would hinder environmental monitoring. Companies, rather than individuals, are regulated. Those enterprises must be prepared for regulatory compliance regardless of whether employees are ill with any disease.
Federal law allows states to regulate polluters to a degree greater than federal standards, but not below federal standards. It’s a credit to the Wolf administration that the state Department of Environmental Protection has rejected the federal decision to look the other way.
A DEP spokesman said the agency would consider regulatory waiver requests on a case-by-case basis but would not adopt the federal blanket policy. And, the agency said it continues to enforce state and federal environmental rules.
That is the correct posture. Now, the challenge will be to maintain environmental vigilance amid the impending state budget deficit - probably in the range of $5 billion - that will result from the pandemic’s economic impact.
Online: https://bit.ly/2VODs8f
___
Vigilance, data keys to momentum
The Scranton Times-Tribune
April 20
Even though deaths and new cases have increased, state-mandated business lockdowns and physical distancing appear finally to be “flattening the curve” of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The rate of infection has slowed in Pennsylvania, New York and most other places, allowing a ray of optimism that had been as rare as sunshine in a Northeast Pennsylvania February.
Adding to the hope is Gilead Science’s announcement that its drug remdesivir, which it developed to fight Ebola, had proved to be effective against COVID-19 in a clinical trial conducted by University of Chicago Medicine.
And, researchers at Oxford University, the University of Pittsburgh Center for Vaccine Research, and several other research centers around the world have said they have developed promising vaccines.
Such hope is deeply welcome in a nation wracked by health and economic anxiety. And now, several governors, including Gov. Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania, have rolled out plans to restart business activity and diminish the staggering unemployment caused by the pandemic.
But normalcy remains well beyond the near horizon. Recovery plans still preclude large gatherings and, therefore, much of the social activity to which Americans are accustomed, from dining out to sports events and concerts.
Vigilance - wearing masks in public places, maintaining physical distance, sound hygiene and especially vigorous hand-washing - remain crucial to finally defeating the virus.
Likewise, test-derived data are crucial to further steering the scope and speed of the recovery.
The nature of the contagion also has ensured that the nation’s social and economic recovery from it would be incremental. As hope rises for the opening phases of that recovery, it is as important as ever to maintain vigilance, comply with best practices and gather the needed data.
Online: https://bit.ly/3cFk0Sa
___
If you want Pa. to ‘reopen’ soon, gathering in a crowd at the state Capitol is not the best move
LNP
April 22
Several Republican state lawmakers attended a rally Monday at the state Capitol in Harrisburg aimed at pressuring Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf to reopen Pennsylvania businesses. As Cynthia Fernandez of Spotlight PA reported, “Monday’s demonstration was planned in part by Chris Dorr, an Ohio-based far-right activist who organized similar protests with his brothers in other states.”
Hundreds of protesters who turned out to Monday’s “Reopen PA” rally undermined their desired outcome by standing - largely unmasked - cheek to jowl outside the state Capitol, practically begging to be infected by the novel coronavirus.
They would have more effectively advanced their cause by staying home, as the health care workers who staged a small, socially distanced counterprotest implored them to do.
We have been under a statewide stay-at-home order since April 1; Wolf extended that order Monday to May 8. The shutdown of most of the commonwealth’s businesses has been essential in flattening the curve of COVID-19 infection, medical experts say. But it has exacted a brutal economic toll, imperiling small businesses and leading 1 in 5 Pennsylvania workers to file for unemployment compensation. An estimated 18% of Lancaster County’s labor force is now out of work.
We want the commonwealth to be able to reopen businesses soon, too. Arguing in favor of the shutdown means arguing against our own economic interests. Newspapers rely on advertising revenue from restaurants, movie theaters, retailers and other businesses. The news industry - including LNP ’ LancasterOnline - has taken a major hit because of the pandemic shutdown.
But, as painful as job losses are, they pale when compared to loss of life.
The state Department of Health announced Tuesday that 1,564 people had died from COVID-19 in Pennsylvania. Lancaster County Coroner Dr. Stephen Diamantoni said our county has seen 107 deaths so far.
Pennsylvania has 34,528 cases of COVID-19; 1,295 cases are in Lancaster County.
Those numbers explain why so many people looked at images from Monday’s rally and shuddered.
Not because of the handful of protesters wielding semi-automatic rifles. Playacting at looking tough, they just looked silly at the peaceful rally. (The Second Amendment has nothing to do with COVID-19, but rally organizer Chris Dorr is a hardcore gun rights activist.)
We didn’t shudder because of the signs that warned of tyranny (exaggerate much?). Or because of the kid holding a sign reading “Let Me Play Golf! Open PA Courses” through the sunroof of a Lexus. (We thought that had to be parody.)
We worried for the people who are so genuinely fearful about their economic circumstances that they risked their health to attend a rally that didn’t offer much more than grandstanding by self-serving politicians and the theater of outrage.
We worried for the police officers who were forced, by duty, to shepherd the protesters.
We worried for the small group of health care workers from the Service Employees International Union who held signs reading, “I Don’t Want You in My ICU,” and “My Life Is On the Line. Go Home.”
And we worried about the rally’s public health implications. One of the rally’s speakers, Republican state Sen. Judy Ward, voiced concern about the rallygoers who weren’t wearing masks. Ward, who’s a registered nurse, was booed.
We are being asked to avoid crowds, to keep safe distances of at least 6 feet from others, for medical reasons. Not for political ones.
It’s true that the economic pain of the shutdown hasn’t been evenly distributed. Many white-collar workers can work remotely. A small business can’t make money if it isn’t allowed to open its doors to customers.
But the shutdown won’t last forever. And we can’t rush to end it prematurely. We have to get this right the first time, or we’ll face another wave of infections, another potential round of shutdowns.
And here’s the reality: While some people are sacrificing more than others, no one is sacrificing as much as the health care workers who are putting their lives on the line during this pandemic.
Doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists and other hospital employees go to work not sure what they’ll face that day or night.
How many feverish, coughing patients will be coming through the emergency department doors.
How many patients’ families will need to be told that their loved ones, suffering in isolation, may not make it.
How many patients will need to be intubated on their shift. In that procedure, a flexible breathing tube is inserted down a patient’s throat so a ventilator can help the patient breathe. Virus-laden aerosols and particles escape from the patient’s airways, putting those performing the procedure at risk. (This is one reason why personal protective equipment is so essential.)
Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health spokesman John Lines told LNP ’ LancasterOnline this week that 71 LG Health employees have tested positive for COVID-19. About half were exposed at work.
Some hospital employees are staying apart from their families to protect them from infection. If they do go home, they strip off their scrubs in their garages or entryways and put them directly in the washing machine. They disinfect every item - keys, phone, wallet, watch - they took with them into the hospital. They don’t hug their spouses or kids until they’ve had hot showers. Surface germs can be rinsed away, but the anxiety and fear cannot.
They bear that fear and anxiety for us. They accept the lines etched onto their faces by the goggles and masks they wear to shield themselves from the virus. They shouldn’t need to bear the brunt of our irresponsibility and our disregard for public health.
We’re all in this together, we said when this all started. But we’ve come to realize that’s not completely true. Those who exploited the concerns of ordinary Pennsylvanians to stage a political rally Monday aren’t really in this crisis with them.
And those rushing to reopen Pennsylvania aren’t with the health care workers risking their lives to save others. If they were, they’d heed their warnings.
Online: https://bit.ly/2yC8E2A
___
Partisanship is more deadly than the coronavirus
The Philadelphia Inquirer
April 20
There are many frightening aspects to the coronavirus pandemic. Among the most frightening is how much we still don’t know.
We don’t know why some cities and areas of the country are seeing higher mortality rates than others. We don’t know what percentage of the population is currently infected, and what percentage may have immunity. We don’t know when we will have an adequate supply of N95 masks and tests.
Amid this uncertainty, one thing is clear: There is something more fatal than the virus, and that is political partisanship. We’re not just talking about the way President Donald Trump has often defaulted to partisan swipes and blaming other parties and administrations for the crisis, though that is damaging enough. We’re talking about the battles that are firming up along political lines about when it will be safe to reopen the economy - and whether “safe” should even be a criteria.
In Pennsylvania, the state legislature last week passed a measure that would reopen the economy for those businesses that adhere to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines. SB 613 would effectively overrule Gov. Tom Wolf’s closure of nonessential businesses that is set to expire April 30. Wolf says he will veto the bill.
Seeing our elected officials playing out the same tired old partisan dramas is disheartening and depressing. They should be doing what the rest of the country is doing from community to community, neighborhood to neighborhood: putting aside differences and figuring out how to offer support and solve problems together.
Of course, the economy is important. People are suffering from its sudden collapse. (That’s in part because of the shaky ground on which it was built, with few safety nets in place.) Businesses need to get back on their feet. But a rational and transparent framework and detailed plan driven by what we do know must be in place before that can happen.
That would require both sides of the aisle in Harrisburg to commit themselves to putting a plan together that makes sense for all - and for sharing that plan and the thinking underlying it with the rest of the public. That should be the minimum criteria for the reopening of the economy. We have not only seen little evidence of that, but we are still at the point that the public’s health depends on crude homemade masks because no one quite knows where the next big supply of medical-grade masks is coming from.
We are also lacking the capacity for the widespread testing that most experts agree is critical to a return to “normal.”
The idea that certain businesses can open, even at a staggered pace, without acknowledging that a plan for schools and day care must also be resolved so parents can actually return to work is also worrisome.
This crisis has altered almost every aspect of society. The best-case scenario is that many of them will lead to positive, needed changes - in the structure of the economy, for example. If it doesn’t alter how our political system operates, prioritizing partisan victories over the public good, then this crisis truly will have been in vain.
Online: https://bit.ly/2VMxuF7
___
Mask confusion: Health officials give conflicting messages
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
April 22
If you’re confused by the conflicting messages the public has received on the necessity - or uselessness - of wearing a mask in public, you’re not alone. Of the many sound guidelines and safety suggestions delivered over the past month to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, this is one area where health officials have been far too slow to react, and alarmingly indecisive.
At first we were told not to buy masks because it would diminish the supply for the medical professionals who need them most. That was the Twitter message from the U.S. surgeon general on Feb. 29, who added that masks “are NOT effective in preventing (the) general public from catching” the coronavirus.
Even if that may not have made complete sense - how do masks protect health care workers if they can’t protect the public? - most Americans were willing to set aside the skepticism and leave the masks for those in the medical field.
Over the intervening weeks, as more information about the ever-changing novel coronavirus came out, researchers learned that asymptomatic and presymptomatic individuals could spread the virus before they were sick. Wearing a mask, researchers said, could help stop infected people from spreading the virus to others.
The issue of asymptomatic carriers was known since February and became more apparent through the month of March, but it wasn’t until April 3 that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a recommendation that Americans wear homemade cloth face coverings “… as an additional, voluntary public health measure.” The emphasis there was on “voluntary.”
That changed for Pennsylvania residents on April 15 when the Department of Health issued an order requiring customers and employees at businesses still operating to wear masks. Pennsylvania joins New York, New Jersey and Maryland as states that now require people to wear masks in public.
All of this raises an obvious question: If masks can offer even the slightest bit of protection, and they are homemade so as not to cut into supplies for health care workers, why not recommend wearing them from the start?
Though there is no clear-cut data on their effectiveness, there’s certainly enough anecdotal evidence that they could help stop the spread of COVID-19.
Other countries - Hong Kong, China, South Korea - recommended wearing masks as early as January. They appear to be on the downward side of the pandemic.
While the message on wearing masks has been conflicting, the one point on which health officials agree is that the masks serve as protection not for the person wearing it, but for those in close proximity. So wearing a mask is actually a safety precaution to prevent someone who may be asymptomatic from unknowingly spreading the virus.
Wearing masks in public appears to be the new normal for Pennsylvania residents for the foreseeable future, but one can’t help but wonder if it’s something that should have been started weeks ago.
Online: https://bit.ly/2RTm1Cv
___
Please read our comment policy before commenting.