Lockdown grueling, 19 deaths show it’s a way to go
By JOSH RESNEK
As time goes by, Everett residents are left with the growing feeling that life is changing all around the city, again.
There were only ten reported new cases of the virus Tuesday after many weeks of rising numbers.
Perhaps this marks the beginning of the end of the spread or it doesn’t.
The city shutdown remains a shutdown. The vast majority of those seen on the city’s streets and congregating among themselves are wearing facemasks and practicing social distancing requirements to reduce the spread of the virus.
Change, however, is in the air.
Residents feel like getting out.
The end of the lockdown remains at least two to four weeks from ending – with some aspects of life ready for a gradual reopening of some of the city’s widespread commercial outlets which have been closed for almost a month and a half.
There is a vast amount of automobile traffic roaming around the city’s highways and streets – proving that life still abounds in the crowded city despite the virus.
The most recent numbers published by the city Tuesday revealed 1,179 infected by the virus, and 19 dead as a result of it.
This compares with last week’s 862 infected and 16 deaths.
The facemask order and curfew remain in effect.
The city government has been reduced to Zoom meetings – electronic meetings where all the elected officials can interact with residents by computer at the same time on the same screen, and later by video for downloading.
This new aspect of life in the age of coronavirus holds one of the keys to reopening the city without endangering all the players.
It may hold one of the keys to reopening the public schools, which is expected to be an ordeal of planning and management with anticipated money and personnel shortages.
The city council, the school committee and the board of appeals have all met on line in recent days doing the city’s business.
This notes unequivocally, the birth of the new age being sprung upon us, when open, public meetings have been replaced by meetings that are entirely electronic.
For instance, City Clerk Sergio Cornelio has been doing many of his key city clerk activities online, including marrying people!
Many city councilors are out and about helping others, chief among them, Mike McLaughlin, Stephanie Martins, Fred Capone and Gerly Adrien.
They have been noticeably present at food pantries and helping to give out food to residents in need of it.
“I am really optimistic,” McLaughlin told the Leader Herald Tuesday morning.
“We are going to get through this tough time. The longer we hold out, the lower the bad numbers will be,” he added.
Figures of those who are infected and those who died from the virus in neighboring Chelsea and Revere continue to dwarf those here.
In Chelsea, well over 2,000 are reported infected.
More than 100 have died of the virus.
In Revere, the Revere Journal, a newspaper there, reported at least seven virus connected deaths on its obit pages last week.
Revere’s numbers dwarf those in Everett as well.
The City government has failed to establish a single public virus testing location within our boundaries for Everett residents.
Everett residents seeking a test are made to go to a location in Malden or to two locations in Chelsea.
Going to Chelsea for a test could be dangerous to Everett residents’ health.
Testing is believed to be the way out of this mess that has shut down the economy and brought every city and town nearly to its knees across the state and the nation… and the world.
The next two to three weeks will tell all of us how the lessening of restrictions has aided the nation in ridding itself of the virus.
That’s how long it takes for the virus to gestate in other victims and being spread be- cause social distancing has been decreased on beaches and in public places everywhere, and especially among those shouting for their freedom to do as they please.
Whether this has been accomplished or we have to go back into strict shutdown is what hangs in the balance.