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'Like leaning into a left hook': coronavirus calamity unfolds across divided US[
www.theguardian.com]
A disaster is unfolding in Montgomery, Alabama, where Martin Luther King preached and where Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on the bus. Hospitals are running short of drugs to treat Covid-19, intensive care units are close to capacity, and ventilators are running short.
Between 85% and 90% of the very sick and dying are African American.
Amid this gathering storm, the city council met to decide whether to require people to wear masks, a basic protection the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) strongly recommends. Doctors lined up to plead their case.
“This is beyond an epidemic in this area,” said the pulmonologist Bill Saliski. “Our units are full of critically ill covid patients. We have to slow this down.”
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McGlothan told the council: “People don’t believe the hype. Until you mandate masks, we won’t be able to stop this – we just won’t.”
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The council debated for two hours. White council members asked if young children could get carbon monoxide poisoning from masks – no, the doctors firmly told them – and spoke portentously about individual rights.
“At the end of the day,” said councilman Brantley Lyons, “if a pandemic comes through, we do not throw our constitutional rights out the window.”
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In a 4-4 tie, the ordinance failed. As he left the chamber, Dr Saliski uttered just one word: “Unbelievable.”