Veronica Pena believes she’s spent the last year cautiously navigating the Covid-19 pandemic in Florida, which is largely free of restrictions. The Miami Beach resident has avoided going to bars, has routine blood tests, and maintains a close circle of friends who are just as careful as she is.
Pena has a new self-imposed limitation as she waits for her Covid-19 vaccine shot: She is adamant about not venturing out.
“I don’t see anyone taking any precautions, whatsoever,” Pena, 32, told CNN. “No one’s wearing masks, no one’s social distancing.”
Veronica Pena believes she’s spent the last year cautiously navigating the Covid-19 pandemic in Florida, which is largely free of restrictions. The Miami Beach resident has avoided going to bars, has routine blood tests, and maintains a close circle of friends who are just as careful as she is.
Pena has a new self-imposed limitation as she waits for her Covid-19 vaccine shot: She is adamant about not venturing out.
“You see those pictures of people crowded into bars, for example, especially indoors, no masks, basically no physical distancing,” Cindy Prins, an epidemiologist at the University of Florida said. “That just creates an unfortunately ideal situation for transmission of Covid.”
The crowds aren’t expected to thin out anytime soon, according to the Miami Beach police chief, who claims that tourists have increased in recent weeks and that this trend will likely continue into April.
Pena isn’t only concerned about contracting the virus. She, like local authorities and experts, is concerned that the crowds will contribute to more spikes and destruction in her neighborhood and around the world, as she witnessed firsthand when her grandmother died of the virus in October.
“I’m afraid of more deaths, just as I’ve seen and been a part of the Covid casualties,” she said. “As a result of the carelessness and inconsideration, we’re losing people left and right.”
Residents in South Florida who spoke with CNN voiced similar concerns, adding that they appreciate government leaders’ challenging decisions as they strive to strike a balance between the need for a prosperous economy and the protection of a community. Several residents, however, shared their desire for the state to accept tourists in a safer way, with tougher punishments for rule-breakers.
Since the pandemic started, Florida has reported more than 2 million infections and 32,700 virus-related deaths.
Over the summer, it was one of the country’s Covid-19 hotspots, with hundreds of hospitals reporting a shortage of ICU beds, and infections spiked again days after Gov. Ron DeSantis relaxed state restrictions on bars and restaurants in Southeastern Florida.
In September, Gov. Ron DeSantis lifted state limits on bars and restaurants. There was never a statewide mask requirement, and the governor has prohibited local councils from implementing their own legislation.
Local governments across the state have preferred to enforce their own limits, such as curfews and mask standards. However, DeSantis recently signed an executive order canceling all pandemic-related penalties levied by local governments between March 1, 2020, and March 10, 2021.
According to some Florida officials, getting their Covid-19 numbers to trend in the right direction has been a long and difficult path.
They are concerned that carefree vacationers, together with highly infectious variants now circulating and a limited number of completely vaccinated citizens, will undo the gains made so far.
Gelber, who lives in Miami Beach, is also scared. “We have too many people coming who want to just let loose in unacceptable ways,” he said recently. “We have a pandemic, including, I believe, ground central for the variant.”
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease specialist, said Friday that that variant — B.1.1.7 — already accounts for around 20 to 30 percent of all current infections in the world, and that number is increasing, adding that it’s likely linked to a “increase in severity of disease”.
According to other recent studies, the variant could be linked to a higher risk of dying from Covid-19.
According to the CDC, Florida has the largest number of confirmed cases of the variant.
Experts, like Wen, have cautioned that if high levels of infection persist as the nation works to vaccinate more Americans, the virus is more likely to mutate, resulting in more dangerous strains that are not only more transmissible but also pose a problem for vaccines.
“The more population spread there is, the more these variants will evolve, which could really set us back,” Wen explained.
