| | | Georgia Is In Play Political Wireby Taegan Goddard
OOPS!!
Georgia Reopens With No Spike In Deaths
Governor Brian Kemp Succeeds in Safely Returning Georgia to WorkThe argument that coming out of lockdown could result in large scale death has been around since the U.S first shut down its economy. Yet a week after reopening, Georgia has shown the fear may be unfounded. It has been almost a month since Georgia reopened its businesses, and there have been no spike in deaths as some had expected. Governor Brian Kemp announced his plans to do so at a conference on April 20th.
Many residents of Georgia returned to work on the 24th. Georgia was the first state to do so. Despite many concerns that the loosening of lock-down could lead to increased cases of infection and deaths, they have in fact been declining. While strict social distancing guidelines are still in place, Georgia could be used as a case study regarding reopening businesses in other states around the US.
As of May 5th, Georgia had 33,405 infections and 1,450 deaths. Approximately 350 deaths had occurred in the two week period following the reopening of businesses, which compared to the two weeks prior during lock down shows a steady decrease. There were approximately 500 deaths in the state from the 10th to the 24th, meaning not only was there no spike in deaths, the opposite was true.
Similarly, the total number of infections has gone up by roughly 7,000 during the weeks following the reopening. This is less than the increase of 10,000 the two weeks prior. The numbers indicate that the state of Georgia is taking small steps towards fighting its unemployment rates. Its actions could be largely beneficial to recovering economically from the COVID-19 crisis. |
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