Coronavirus: Trump Tells Governors He Plans to Revise Social Distancing Guidelines

Mar. 26–The federal government will move to relax social distancing recommendations for some counties as President Trump hopes to restart the nation's economy in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, the president wrote in a letter to governors Thursday.

Officials are developing a scale to classify counties as low, medium and high risk for the deadly virus, which would let state and local leaders make “decisions about maintaining, increasing, or relaxing social distancing and other measures they have put in place,” Trump wrote in the letter.

Those ratings, which will be based in part on increased testing for the virus, will only be guidelines. State and local officials would be able to set their own policies, such as Gov. Gavin Newsom's statewide stay-at-home order for California.

Trump's letter doesn't include any specific scientific reasoning behind relaxing restrictions. But the president has talked about his desire to restart the U.S. economy in time for Easter, two weeks from Sunday, and worried that tough social distancing measures might do more to hurt the country than the disease itself.

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Any broad loosening in restrictions would fly in the face of advice from most epidemiologists and public health experts, who say the country needs to take these measures seriously as cases and deaths continue to mount in California and around the country.

Lee Riley, a professor of infectious diseases at UC Berkeley's School of Public Health, pointed to the experience of Hong Kong, which appeared to have the virus under control but has seen a spike in new cases after some of its restrictions were eased in recent weeks.

“It's not clear when is the appropriate time to start relaxing,” Riley said. While “the U.S. is a big country and there's lots of diff from city to city and county to county… it's better to be safe instead of letting this get out of control.”

It seems likely that many of the Bay Area's counties, which have recorded some of the highest numbers of coronavirus cases in the country outside of New York, would get high-risk designations and recommendations to continue tough measures like stay-at-home orders. Other parts of California and the country could be given the green light by the federal government to loosen restrictions.

Check back for updates.

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