California has ended the state-wide lockdown. A few weeks ago you heard about triage and the prospect of thousands of deaths. All of a sudden this is over now. Despite the still relatively low intensive care bed capacity, the governor of the most populous state in the USA ordered the lifting of the massive restrictions of the state government that were imposed seven weeks ago in view of the massive numbers of infections. Despite high numbers, the “Golden State” dares to break out of the lockdown and is returning to a regional four-stage system, according to which the regions and counties themselves decide on the extent of the corona restrictions.
California is a stronghold of the Democratic Party – there is hardly any other state where the Joe Biden party is as strong as there. While the president is trying to enforce tougher corona measures at the federal level, his party friends in Sacramento, the capital of California, are striving for exactly the opposite – one week after Biden’s inauguration. Other “blue” states are suddenly opting for easing too, including Illinois, Michigan, California, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Minnesota and New Jersey are now easing measures.
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Heft 02-2021
Tichy’s insight 02-2021: 2021 – Finally living again
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On January 25, the state reported just over 17,000 confirmed new infections. For comparison: in all of Germany, the RKI reported only 6,729 new infections on January 25. But since the corona numbers in California rose for the whole of December despite the lockdown, the West Coast has probably weighed it up – because the unemployment figures also rose massively at the same time. In addition, it is politically justifiable – if the lockdown had been loosened beforehand, Donald Trump would have been given positive credit under certain circumstances.
Now that the Trump era is over, you can apparently forget Corona pretty quickly – and make Joe Biden the Corona savior by the way. The positive Corona image of the USA is now also being drawn in German media, in which world it is commented that the US is on the way to ZeroCovid.
Back to life – thanks to whoever
Of course, the USA is not doing so infinitely badly, as is always claimed: seven European countries have more corona deaths per 100,000 inhabitants than the United States. Donald Trump’s pandemic management was harshly criticized for months, but it was completely ignored that he was not responsible for much of the criticism he was made for. For example, only states can impose a lockdown. California bet on a hard lockdown, Texas, for example, not.
To offset the development in the USA as a whole is relatively insignificant anyway – because the infection process in New York is roughly as decoupled from that in Los Angeles as that in Athens from that in London. The dramatic corona developments were mostly regional, for example New York at the beginning. In Germany, Trump was happily held hostage for this, while the Democratic governor of New York was actually much more responsible – but he spent his time insulting the president. Wherever Trump really had influence, he did a remarkable amount of things right: Very early entry bans, and when it comes to vaccination, the US is also doing extremely well. The proportion of the population that has already been vaccinated is more than three times as high as in Germany.
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Netherlands:
Corona is turning the land of tolerance into a police state
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Now the achievements penetrate – and should probably be credited to Joe Biden, although so far he has really not been able to change the result. In California, the “stay-at-home orders” are being lifted, the night curfew is over and hairdressers, shopping centers and retailers are allowed to open. For example, in Los Angeles County, the state’s worst corona-hit county, this is approved for 25 percent customer capacity and mask requirements. At the end of this week, restaurants will also be allowed to reopen in the open air. Private meetings can now take place with three households and a maximum of 15 people, but only outside until further notice. The move surprised the US Democrats too. “If you think we’ve been caught off guard by the changing and confusing guidelines in the state parliament, you’re right,” said a Democratic MP in the California state legislature.
Either way, California people can get back to life.
By Max Roland and Air Türkis.
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