CHICAGO -- Texas lifted stay-at-home orders for its 29 million residents. Hair salons in Maine welcomed customers back inside. In Alabama, clothing boutiques flung open their doors.Nearly a dozen states tentatively returned to public life Friday, the first mass reopening of businesses since the coronavirus
CHICAGO — Texas lifted stay-at-home orders for its 29 million residents. Hair salons in Maine welcomed customers back inside. In Alabama, clothing boutiques flung open their doors.
The lifting of stringent rules marked a significant new phase in the country’s response to the coronavirus, and came even as confirmed virus cases nationally continue to grow. While the growth rate of the virus has slowed in places like New York and California, new outbreaks are intensifying in Massachusetts, Nebraska and Wisconsin, among other states.
On Friday, as the doors were opened, stickers had been placed 6 feet apart on the pavement outside the boutique. A hand-washing station had been set up just inside the door. Every dressing room had been closed but one, and a single employee was assigned to sanitize it after every customer.
Late this week, New Mexico’s Supreme Court sided with the state’s attorney general, ruling that Hicks must obey the limitations the state has set to address the virus. “We have a barbershop with one chair and some salons that have two chairs,” said Heather Hadwick, the county’s deputy director of emergency services. “Our biggest restaurant has 15 tables.”
Still, the prospect of reopening has been complex. In Iowa, where some restrictions on businesses were lifted Friday, some people said they were uncomfortable with certain regions of the state reopening while others had not. “It feels pretty safe — nobody’s here,” said Leone, a speech pathologist, adding that she did not mind that many of the shops were closed. “It was more about just getting out of the house and walking around.”
But with the number of cases continuing to rise in many states — known deaths from the virus surpassed 63,000 in the U.S. this week — public health experts have warned that reopening too soon could lead to a devastating second wave.
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