Task Force Tells Texas to Tighten Up
on Virus Fight as Latest Record Falls

Controversial Trump Task Force Member Resigns

Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside
December 1, 2020

The coronavirus posted another record spike in Texas on Tuesday as the state contemplated a red flag warning that it received from the White House Coronavirus Task Force on the need to do more to crack down on the community spread.

The Department of State Health Services added 15,182 new infections to the Texas COVID-19 count - the latest in a two-week string of broken daily records that had peaked last week at 14,648. The number of people hospitalized in Texas with covid infections hit its highest point in four months with 9,047 on Tuesday night.

Based on data that was compiled for a report on November 22, the presidential task force advised Texas to follow the lead of states with "aggressive mitigation" efforts under way with accelerated testing and significant reductions in capacity in public and private indoor settings.

The task force said that Texas should take steps to ensure that masks are always worn in public and private gatherings that people who are vulnerable to the disease attend. "New hospital admissions in Texas continue to surge to unsustainable levels and statewide mitigation must increase," according to the report.

But the Trump administration panel's staff was simply making recommendations that states can ignore without concern on potential penalties. That's what Governor Greg Abbott might be inclined to do after arguing late last month that Texans had learned how to cope with the contagion and that he saw no need to issue new restraints with new treatment medications available and a vaccine in the infant stages.

Based on guidance from the White House task force, the Centers for Disease Control and the Harvard Global Health Institute, Texas needs to force all of the bars and gyms to close with restaurants allowed to operate at a maximum of 25 percent capacity. Masks must be required and gatherings with people outside the household would be banned under the consensus guidelines.

Abbott, however, hasn't revised his emergency orders since early October when he gave bars the green lights to open in a move that helped set the stage for the third and most serious surge in terms of infection rates in Texas. While bars have had to close again in most of the counties in West Texas, a substantial number of drinking establishments across the state have increased the percentage of income they derive from food on the menus in order to qualify as a restaurant.

The governor might be waiting until the Legislature convenes in January before any more major decisions on moving Texas back or forward in the management of the state's response to the covid crisis. Abbott could face a challenge from conservatives during the regular session to his authority during public health emergencies. But Abbott can use the dramatic powers that he's wielded up to now in the pandemic as bargaining leverage at the Capitol next year.

more to come ...