By Paul J. Webber | Associated press
ABILENE, Texas – In the weeks since Mark Riggs went from feeling worn out before Thanksgiving to dying of COVID-19 last Monday, only six calls about people not wearing face masks entered the police department of Abilene.
While the challenge to the Texas mask mandate is easy to find here.
When Riggs entered the hospital, a morgue trailer large enough to stack 24 bodies had just arrived. A medical camp tent emerged in the parking lot while doctors moved the 67-year-old college professor to a ventilator. He died in an intensive care unit that has been full for weeks and is the largest of about 15,000 square miles of firefighters and cattle pastures, larger than Maryland.
Officers answered three of the calls about facial coverage, needed since June. No appointments were issued.
“I’ve never been able to call on government or leadership,” said Katie Riggs Maxwell, 38, Riggs ’daughter. “But suddenly it’s extremely personal.”
As virus cases and deaths have skyrocketed across the nation this fall, pressure has intensified on governors who have not issued warrants forcing people to wear masks indoors and in places. public. Health experts consider masks the most effective way to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Most states have statewide orders, and of the next dozen or so, most are in the south.
But the debate over warrants and closures, usually fueled by howls of violation of individual liberties, often stifles the reality of whether the restrictions that apply are applied to make them effective.
In some states like New York, where COVID cases overflowed hospitals earlier this year and were treated like a crisis, authorities have sent police to report rapes, break-ins and even vigil funerals where meetings of people without masks were planned. In California, Los Angeles County has posted more than 300 citations since September to churches, businesses and strip clubs for violations of COVID-19 restrictions.
But in many smaller cities, especially in politically conservative areas of the country like Abilene, there may not be a statewide mandate because the threat of fines is non-existent.
As families prepare to meet for Christmas and create excellent conditions for the spread of the virus, Abilene is unlikely to punish anyone who fails to comply with Texas rules on mask use and limitation. from outdoor meetings to 10 people, even as doctors are overwhelmed by rejecting transfers from smaller hospitals and the city of 125,000 people struggling to eliminate a worsening outbreak.
On Thursday, Texas broke a one-day record of new coronavirus cases with more than 16,000. Hospitalizations are at their highest levels since July and are on the rise.
Across the United States, attempts to vigorously mask restaurant mandates and seat limits have been met with challenges and sometimes threats of violence. In Tennessee, police officers this month began accompanying Memphis inspectors after some had faced racial insults. Maryland Department of Health inspectors have also been harassed, especially female inspectors, according to county officials.
There is no conflict in Abilene. Mayor Anthony Williams, who tested positive for the virus this summer, sees the application as a logistical difficulty and an economic burden in a city where unemployment has multiplied tenfold in June. “We don’t want to exaggerate the problem,” he said.
Hospital leaders say they have not asked the city to reconsider.
“I don’t think he would be well received by the typical West Texas native either,” said Dr. Stephen Lowry, chief of staff at Hendrick Health in Abilene. He described them as “the typical robust individualist, who didn’t want to be told what to do.”
He and the mayor believe Abilene’s neighbors have recently resorted to putting on masks and avoiding rallies. Churches stopped face-to-face services. Cases continue to rise, but are no longer as rapid in Taylor County as a whole, where at least 150 people have died, a figure that has doubled since Nov. 1.
However, residents and businesses are allowed to set their own limits, including none.
At the prudent end is the downtown Paramount Theater, which closed indefinitely as cases escalated before Thanksgiving though it could remain open. The theater had sold tickets for the screening of a Christmas classic. Now people passing by take pictures of an involuntary summation of 2020 in the red lettering tent of the time: “IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE CANCELED.”
Grayson Allred, the theater’s technical director, said they noticed that many patrons who came in with masks took them off after they were inside.
“Air will circulate here and there is no way out of it,” he said.
While many schools in other countries depend on remote learning, most of Abilene’s 15,000 students returned to their campuses this fall. Traffic in the corridor was redirected in one direction and masks were needed. A teacher who tested positive for the virus died.
At The Shed Market, one of Abilene’s favorite barbecues, there are no signs on the door that favor face coverage or social distancing inside. Behind the counter unmasked employees place orders. One of the grandparents of owner Byron Stephenson died of COVID-19. Stacie Stephenson, his wife and also owner, is a former registered nurse.
“It’s been very difficult trying to decide what to do,” he said. “The nursing part of my brain thinks one way and then the part of my brain that owns a business thinks another way. And so I feel like my feelings about that change, you know, once a week. “
Mark Riggs took the virus seriously at Abilene Christian University, where he ended his career after 16 years as a biostatistician at the hospital.
Classroom desks were six feet apart and equipment disinfected the room after each lesson. He and his wife, Debbie, stopped going to church.
He still picked it up. The first signs appeared after a night of Christmas decorations hanging with her grandchildren, ages 6 and 3. Doctors put him on an air pump to help him breathe in the two days after hospitalization. When his condition worsened and the only option was a fan, his family first requested a video call with him. His last words: “This is not the end of my story.”
He died a week later. On Wednesday, Williams ’mayor took to Facebook to defend the virus’s handling in the city and remind people that vaccines were on the way. He annoyed Debbie Riggs, who says that even though she finds silver lining, she plans a funeral.
“For the mayor to say there’s light at the end of the tunnel, that’s not helpful right now,” said Debbie Riggs, who was on campus where her 41-year-old husband taught for more than two decades. “This is not taking action.”