Politics & Government
Mayor Streit said the new 5-phase regional plan that was “instituted without legislative approval” seems to abandon the previous strategy.
By Andrea Earnest, Patch Staff
May 8, 2020 11:22 am CT | Updated May 8, 2020 3:38 pm CT
LOCKPORT, IL — In a social media post, Lockport Mayor Steven Streit outlined concerns he has with the Restore Illinois plan released Tuesday.
“I am baffled by what appears to be an abandonment of the original strategy to fight Covid19,”
Streit said the new five-phase regional plan that was “instituted without legislative approval” seems to abandon the previous strategy of staying home to flatten the curve.
According to the Restore Illinois plan, phase 5 will only occur if there is a vaccine or a treatment that ensures health care capacity isn’t a concern, or if there are no new cases over a sustained period. The plan stipulates that a sustained increase in test positivity rates, hospital admissions or a reduction in health care capacity could cause regions to move backward through the phases.
“It is unclear to me how we can ever build herd immunity if every time there is a rise in infections (which was always expected) we are returned by the Governor and the IDPH to phase one isolation,” Streit said.Subscribe
According to David Dowdy and Gypsyamber D’Souza, epidemiologists at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, so-called herd immunity is a dangerous misconception when it comes to the new coronavirus.
“We wish to state clearly that herd immunity against COVID-19 will not be achieved at a population level in 2020, barring a public health catastrophe,” they write on Johns Hopkins coronavirus website. Even in hotspots like New York City, they say, infection rates fall far short of the 70 percent necessary to reach population immunity.
“Put another way, even if the current pace of the COVID-19 pandemic continues in the United States — with over 25,000 confirmed cases a day — it will be well into 2021 before we reach herd immunity. If current daily death rates continue, over half a million Americans would be dead from COVID-19 by that time,” David and D’Souza write.
Streit also questioned why the medical facility set up in McCormick Place in Chicago is being dismantled.
“It was explained to me this morning that one of the reasons Will County was yoked with Chicago in the regional recovery was because it enabled Will County to have enough hospital beds,” Streit said. “Why we are removing the McCormick facility before the expected surge comes is a question that I cannot get an answer for.”
Streit also took issue with “the inconsistencies of what is essential and not essential.” He noted that Walmart can be open, but a small business which has fewer people in it cannot be.
“Cannabis and liquor stores are ‘essential’ but not tobacco or vape shops?” Streit questioned. “Mayors and councils know the businesses in their communities well enough to help them manage social distance practices and should be given the ability to do so. This permission, though, needs to come from the governor; otherwise, any business that chooses to open will risk litigation.”
Streit said the five-phase plan puts all the decision-making into the hands of the governor and “unnamed bureaucrats from the Illinois Department of Health.”
“Just as the nation’s governors didn’t want the president telling them when they could open or close their states, local leaders need to have some autonomy on how to manage their communities,” Streit said.
New Lenox Mayor Baldermann will host a meeting with six local mayors and infectious disease experts to discuss the Restore Illinois plan released by Gov. J.B. Pritzker. Streit confirmed to Patch he will be attending the meeting.
Lockport is in the five-phase plan’s northeast region, which has the highest number of cases in the state, with the city of Chicago alone having 28,441 confirmed cases of coronavirus, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health. The rest of Cook County has 19,900 cases, followed by Lake County with 4,762, DuPage County with 4,213 and Will County with 3,466.
