Even though there are only 5 cases of COVID-19 in Erie County, all of whom are either young people recuperating at home, or one college student who tested positive after returning home to eastern New York, County Executive Kathy Dahlkemper, following the lead of Governor Wolf, issued a stay at home order for county residents. Following right on her heels, Erie Mayor, Joe Schember, declared a state of emergency. No hospitalizations for the coronavirus and no fatalities, but an emergency was declared anyway. Oddly enough, a hospital just next door in Crawford County, Meadville Medical Center, is laying off 200 employees due to lack of work as many departments are closing down. It makes you wonder what our local officials are thinking, but it’s not very hard to figure out.
… by officially declaring a state of emergency “it helps ensure that we can be reimbursed by the federal government for any expenses incurred by the city” related to combating the coronavirus.
… the emergency declaration is important to obtain federal funding in response to covid-19. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will reimburse the city for up to 75 percent of emergency costs incurred while under an emergency declaration, Schember said.
It’s no secret the City of Erie is in very poor financial straits and the county is certainly not flush with cash, what better way to get a dollar infusion than to declare a state of emergency and request FEMA reimbursement.
Could it be that simple? Yes.
Erie Mayor Joe Schember declares state of emergency over covid-19
Matt Putman says
Your posts are usually very insightful and thought provoking. Unless I am not understanding the two COVID-19 related posts correctly, it sounds like you are placing a higher priority on the economy than concern for human life. Over history our country has pulled through crisis including two world wars and the 9/11 attacks that have required sacrifices by all. I believe this is one of those times given we have now exceeded over 100K cases of COVID-19 that we have to endure sacrifice for the good of all. by social isolation to minimize the spread. I agree it is painful to anyone enduring financial impact, but given the potential for massive spreading of this very serious disease, I support social isolation until the medical experts determine the risks are controllable.
Paul Crowe says
We have about 100,000 cases and 1700 deaths. Cases may be asymptomatic, showing no symptoms at all or have very mild symptoms. Most cases will lead to full recovery. Be sure not to confuse cases with deaths in your estimation of the severity of this epidemic, I’m sure you didn’t, but it’s easy to do.
In comparison, last flu season:
We have a very long way to go before we match the death toll from seasonal flu, let alone exceed those numbers, but unless someone is interested in these figures, how many die from various other causes is an unknown and not a concern because it’s not on the news all day, every day.
A couple of days ago, Dr. Birx, in the daily press briefing, acknowledged that early estimates of the virus’s transmissability and death rate from the Imperial College study and others do not match data now being gathered on the ground. The reason is that no one knew how many people actually had it or have it. Getting it does not mean you will display any symptoms at all or if you do they may be mild and they will never be reported to any medical personnel. In other words, the numerator of the fraction is known, it’s the number of deaths, but the denominator, how many are or have been infected is a wild guess. As more testing is done and found cases increase, the denominator gets bigger and the fatality rate constantly drops. It’s simple math, but most people shy away from numbers and react to predictions of doom from math-challenged reporters.
My mistake in writing about the virus was making the decision to write about the virus in the first place. The public’s awareness of what a “pandemic” is seems to be a combination of Hollywood movies like the old Andromeda Strain or the more recent, World War Z, people instantly getting infected from something that’s always fatal, but the reality in this situation is far less dramatic and combined with the reporting by those who are writing or speaking before they have any understanding makes for an unappetizing soup. Trying to say something meaningful here on this site that everyone can understand before their attention wanders is damn near impossible.
The effects of the virus are not uniform across ages, health status or geographic location, New York City has a major problem as do several other major cities, here in Erie County, we do not. We are not packed in high rise apartments riding mass transit everywhere, we can practice personal hygiene while continuing to work, but if we destroy the economy by shutting everything down for too long, you’ll see far more human life lost than this virus could ever cause.
(As noted above in this comment, I realize I never should have begun writing about this issue at all. The complexity of the topic and the emotion shown by many makes it an unpleasant effort and to continue will yield little benefit to anyone. I’m turning off comments and do not plan to write anything further about it. The next post was already published as I write this.)