Miami Area Mayors See Covid-19 Rise; Won’t Reverse Opening
Miami Area Mayors See Covid-19 Uptick But Won’t Restart Lockdown
(Bloomberg) -- Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez said he was watching indicators of a recent uptick in Covid-19 cases, but he doesn’t plan to reinstate lockdowns or otherwise roll back the reopening of Florida’s biggest county.
His remarks follow those made earlier Monday by the Miami and Miami Beach mayors who also aren’t planning to reverse their reopenings. Both cities are in Gimenez’s county.
Speaking in a virtual press conference, Gimenez said he was focused on hospital capacity, which he said there was “plenty of” in Miami-Dade County.
“I always have concerns about Covid-19, never know what this virus is going to do,” Gimenez said. “I’m just not – we’re not ready to say that we’re going to be closing down our economy. That’s the last thing I want to do.”
He said he would be watching the data in the coming days to see if it provides added evidence for a concerning trend, or if the numbers end up being a “hiccup.”
Earlier Monday, City of Miami Mayor Francis Suarez also pointed to hospitalizations as the main metric that could trigger a reevaluation of the reopening policy.
But he said he was concerned that two other key metrics -- cases and positivity rates among test batches -- were both increasing.
“We’re kind of sounding the alarm,” Suarez said.
Suarez and Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber said they would refrain from going into the next phase of reopening at this time, meaning night clubs and entertainment venues will stay closed.
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