Board of Aldermen 12-22-2020 Page 26
Someone else sent me a copy of an article from the Lancet — which is a British Medical Journal saying that
this article showed that a curfew had no effect whatsoever. Well | read the article and as a matter of fact
the article talked about public measures having a significant effect. VVhat it did say was a curfew had less
of an effect than a complete lockdown but it still had an effect. So comparing it to a complete lockdown, it
has less of an effect than a lockdown but it does have an effect. And 1! would just like to read something
from the CDC issued guidance for public health strategies. This is guidance to local governments and what
they should do dated December 11". And it said that there is a risk of infection through exposure to
infectious respiratory droplets and aerosols even though no symptoms are apparent because transmission
can occur from asymptomatic infected persons. So people that don’t have any symptoms can carry the
virus and spread it.
Outside the household setting, close physical contact shared meals, and being in enclosed spaces, have all
been associated with an increased infection risk. Exposures at non-essential, indoor settings pose a
preventable risk to all participants. Indoor venues like restaurants and bars have been identified as
particularly high risk scenarios. So for people to deny that going to a restaurant or a bar and exposing
yourself to strangers and taking your mask off to drink and eat, there is the exposure that you are putting
yourself at risk to and you are exposing others to that is a non-essential activity that poses a risk. And to
say that going to restaurants is completely safe just isn’t supported, it just isn’t true, it is just not supported.
You know, people have also pointed to New York City and said that the statistics in New York show a very
low, less than 2% of the cases come from restaurants and bars. Well those statistics were after New York
imposed severe restrictions on restaurants and bars. They were closed for a long period of time and then
they opened on a very limited basis and the numbers started going back up. So they started imposing
more restrictions one of which was a 10:00 p.m. curfew that they imposed back in November. And now
they are closing them again, in order to control the increase in numbers. So for people to say that our
Health Department doesn’t know what it is doing, that it is imposing these restrictions without any basis, is
just wrong.
We are not, to say that we are just, you know that we gave these people guidance and they are complying
with it and now we are shutting them down completely is not true. They are not, the Board of Health is not
shutting them down completely. Maybe they should; but they are not. They are not shutting them down
completely they are asking them to close at 9:30 in order to reduce the amount of exposure and people say
they haven't given us any reason? They did explain, if we listen to them they’ve explained that as the night
goes on, people are drinking more, their inhibitions go down, their compliance with wearing the mask
lessens and more people start appearing and they lose their, they don’t comply with the guidelines as well
as they do earlier.
The other we that we have to remember is as | said last night, this is serious stuff; we are in a crisis. The
guidelines | just read to you indicate ideally people should not be going to these venues and exposing
themselves, but the Board of Health is trying to soften the blow by rolling it back a little bit and they are
asking us to approve that and hopefully that will have a beneficial affect which will avoid a complete
lockdown in order to deal with the crisis. So | ask my fellow Aldermen to please support the Board of
Health and vote for this ordinance. Thank you.
President Wilshire
Alderman Schmidt
Alderman Schmidt
Thank you, Madam President. First of all | wanted to thank everybody who wrote to us. | did read them all,
| couldn’t answer them all as my cohort has said, there have been so many. But! have written back and
forth with a couple of people. Specifically today | heard from a worker at Martha’s. | asked specifically
what are the protocols you follow. The return message was everything | had hoped for, that people are
actually told to leave if they can’t comply with the mask ordinance.
