Florida governor Ron DeSantis has said coronavirus first started circulating in Miami during the Super Bowl in early February.
The Republican has so far refused to initiate a statewide lockdown despite cases of coronavirus there surging to nearly 7,000, with 857 people hospitalized and 85 dead.
Defending his decision DeSantis said Tuesday: ‘No matter what you do, you’re going to have a class of folks who are going to do whatever the hell they want to.’
Testing in the state at the time of Superbowl was only for those who had been to certain parts of China and the first confirmed case was a month later on March 1.
DeSantis admitted Tuesday: ‘The numbers are pretty stark. I think this thing was circulating during the Super Bowl. Now, Miami’s rate of cases is a lot higher than statewide.’
The Super Bowl took place on February 2 at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens with 62,000 people in attendance. The stadium has since become a drive-thru testing center.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks during a news conference in the Hard Rock Stadium parking lot on March 30. He said coronavirus first started circulating in Miami during the Super Bowl
Around 265 million Americans have now been ordered to stay at home to combat the spread of coronavirus but some states are still refusing to order lockdowns
DeSantis added: ‘Everything’s basically closed. It’s not like there’s anything to do.
‘You can go to work, but other than that there’s just not a whole lot going on. People should just chill out and stay around the house as much as you can.
‘That doesn’t mean you can’t go for a walk or get fresh air. It just means you shouldn’t have big social gatherings.’
DeSantis, a former congressman, has said he hasn’t issued a statewide order because he believes his county-by-county approach works medically and he doesn’t want to punish businesses and workers in small, rural counties that have no or few confirmed cases.
He issued a stay-at-home order Monday for Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties and the Florida Keys, but later said he misspoke when he said it would be in effect until May 15.
He said he meant April 15, despite President Donald Trump now saying social distancing guidelines will be in place until April 30, not Easter as he hoped.
DeSantis has ordered anyone arriving from the New York area and Louisiana into quarantine and issued some statewide measures such as closing bars and gyms and limiting restaurants to takeout and delivery. Several counties in the Tampa Bay area and central Florida have issued their own lockdown orders.
Health care workers test people at a coronavirus testing site setup by the the Florida National Guard in the parking lot of the Hard Rock stadium on March 30, 2020 in Miami Gardens
Health care workers test people at a coronavirus testing site setup by the the Florida National Guard in the parking lot of the Hard Rock stadium on March 30, 2020 in Miami Gardens
Florida’s congressional Democrats on Tuesday blasted Gov. DeSantis’ for his refusal to issue a statewide stay-at-home order to combat the coronavirus outbreak.
They say his ‘lax’ decision will result in thousands of unnecessary deaths, risks the health of doctors and nurses and threatens to overwhelm hospitals.
Democrats say the Republican governor must drop his county-by-county approach and follow other hard-hit states by closing all non-essential businesses and ordering people to stay home except for buying food or medicine, visiting a doctor or going to an essential job. More than 30 states have statewide stay-home orders.
‘Governor, we need you to follow the science — it is reckless and irresponsible to put at risk the people of the State of Florida who you swore to protect,’ Rep. Donna Shalala of Miami said during a conference call with reporters.
Shalala, who was health secretary during the Clinton administration, directed her comments as if addressing DeSantis, saying ‘it is time for you to step up and be the kind of leader people expect of their governor. We plead of you, there will be thousands of lives that are unnecessarily lost if you do not issue this order.’
Last week, DeSantis said a statewide order would be ‘a very blunt instrument.’
‘When you’re ordering people to shelter in place you are consigning … probably hundreds of thousands of Floridians to lose their jobs. You’re throwing their lives potentially into disarray, and if that were something necessary statewide because the health comes first, that would be one thing. But if you look at Florida’s situation right now, this is not a virus that’s impacting every corner of the state,’ he said.
Reps. Lois Frankel of West Palm Beach and Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, who represents the Keys and parts of Miami-Dade, said on the conference call that it is shortsighted of DeSantis to believe rural counties don’t need to be shutdown like the metropolitan areas.
‘The coronavirus is going to hit every nook and cranny of America. All you need is a funeral or a large family dinner and a small community could be infected in a matter of days,’ Frankel said.
Mucarsel-Powell said, ‘I fear for the irreversible damage that waiting this long will do to our hospitals, our families, our communities. I understand the great economic consequence that this action will have, but … by delaying this order it only exacerbates those impacts in the medium and long term.’
Coast Guard orders all cruise ships to remain at sea as two Holland America vessels with 190 people with coronavirus symptoms on board approach Florida
The US Coast Guard has directed all cruise ships to remain at sea as two Holland America cruise liners approach Florida.
Federal, state and local officials have been negotiating over whether the Zaandam and Rotterdam would be allowed to dock at Port Everglades later this week.
Two of four deaths on the Zaandam were blamed on COVID-19 and nine people have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, the company said.
At least 190 more reported symptoms. More than 300 Americans are on Zaandam and Rotterdam.
Passengers board a lifeboat from Holland America Line cruise ship MS Zaandam to be transported to her sister ship Rotterdam (R) on Panama Bay, Panama during a coronavirus disease
Holland America said the Rotterdam took on nearly 1,400 people who appear to be healthy from its sister ship, leaving 450 guests and 602 crew members on the Zaandam.
Florida Gov Ron DeSantis said Tuesday that the state’s healthcare system is stretched too thin to take on the Zaandam’s coronavirus caseload.
‘Just to drop people off at the place where we’re having the highest number of cases right now just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense,’ DeSantis said.
But President Donald Trump has said that he would speak with his fellow Republican about the situation.
‘They’re dying on the ship,’ Trump said. ‘I’m going to do what’s right. Not only for us, but for humanity.’