State loosens COVID-19 restrictions on entertainment venues, sports, summer camps

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey and state Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris today announced more loosening of restrictions related to the COVID-19 disease, allowing schools and entertainment and tourist venues to reopen and youth sports activities and summer camps to resume on a gradual basis.

However, the number of new COVID-19 cases being identified in Alabama actually has increased in recent weeks from a couple hundred per day to the mid 300s per day, Harris said.

Ivey said this is a deadly disease that people must take seriously, but at the same time, she has to balance the economic health of the state with people’s physical health.

More than 500,000 people have filed unemployment claims in the past two months, with more than $1 billion paid out in unemployment compensation, Ivey said.

“That’s a lot of hurt and a lot of pain out there,” she said. “Standing by and letting our businesses collapse while we’ve got hundreds of thousands of folks that are hurting and suffering is not an option. We’ve got to keep our businesses open and keep our people working … Having a life means having a livelihood, too.”

Here are some different elements of the state health officer’s amended “Safer at Home” order:

• Entertainment and tourist venues may reopen at 5 p.m. on Friday, May 22, but they must keep occupancy levels at 50 percent of normal rates, similar to retail establishments and have employees wear face coverings. They also must use reasonable sanitation practices and take reasonable measures to keep customers and visitors from different households at least 6 feet apart.
• Sports teams also may resume conditioning, skill drills and similar activities at 5 p.m. Friday, May 22, but no competitions are allowed until June 15. Players, coaches and officials must maintain 6 feet between one another except for the extent necessary to participate in the athletic activity. They also must refrain from handshakes, high fives and other physical contact not necessary for the athletic activity, wear face coverings when not directly participating, and refrain from sharing water bottles and water coolers. Spectators from different households also are to remain at least 6 feet apart, and organizers of athletic activities should take reasonable steps to disinfect frequently used items and surfaces.
• Day and overnight youth summer camps may begin operations May 23 as long as they take reasonable steps to keep campers and guests from different households at least 6 feet apart and require camp employees and volunteers to wear face coverings.
• Day care facilities no longer will be limited to less than 12 children.
• Schools can resume operation, with reasonable social distancing protocols. While most K-12 schools are ending their academic years, school systems, college and universities do have summer classes, and other types of schools exist, such as truck driving and aviation schools.
• Senior citizen centers will remain closed, and visitation is still prohibited at hospitals and nursing homes, except in extreme cases involving end of life or maternity support.

Regrettably, many nursing homes in the state are still hotbeds for COVID-19, Ivey said.

The previous stay-at-home order and more recent “safer-at-home” orders were not to eliminate the spread of COVID-19 but to slow it down and prevent a surge in hospital intensive care units, Ivey said. Thankfully, that tactic has worked statewide, though there currently is a shortage of intensive care beds in the Montgomery area, she said. Everyone who needed a ventilator has had access to one, she said.

Just like we have learned to live with the flu and other viruses for which there is no known cure, we must learn to adapt to a new way of social interactions until a vaccine can be developed, Ivey said. It’s not realistic for everyone to remain totally isolated from one another forever, she said.

PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY

The key to reopening businesses and activities is people taking personal responsibility, the governor said. That includes business owners, individuals, summer camp operators, coaches, hair stylists and pastors, she said.

“It takes all of us, y’all, being vigilant and adhering to these social distancing guidelines in order to stop the spread of this disease,” Ivey said. “We can all do our part.”

The current order issued today remains in effect through July 3. However, “if things start going in the wrong direction, we reserve the right to come back in and reverse course,” Ivey said.

Harris said there now have been more than 13,000 cases of COVID-19 identified in Alabama and more than 600 people hospitalized. While the number of new cases has grown in recent weeks, the percentage of people tested who are testing positive has declined in the past three weeks, Harris said.

“I don’t think that means we’re out of the woods by any means,” he said. “We continue to have disease transmission here in our state. There’s a lot of care that we need to take and a lot of practices we need to continue to work on.”

Personal responsibility is at the heart of everything, Harris said.

“People can have this disease and spread it and not feel sick,” he said. “The personal responsibility is to protect other people. It’s not just that you yourself are worried about getting infected. We need people to understand they can put others at risk and not even realize it.”

The governor also today announced that the Alabama Department of Public Health has entered into an agreement with Apple and Google to use those companies’ contact tracing apps to determine how people became exposed to COVID-19 by tracing people’s movements using their cell phone data.

Alabama joins North Carolina, South Carolina, North Dakota and 22 countries that are using the Apple and Google apps, Ivey said. She hopes this will be an important tool to slow the spread of the disease, she said.

See the full text of the state’s new “Safer at Home” order, as amended today, and see the governor’s full press conference on her Facebook page.