Stay-at-home recommendation
IDPH ‘recommends’ Illinoisans work from home, limit outings for next three weeks as COVID cases surge
Illinois Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike conducts a recent coronavirus briefing with a masked Gov. Pritzker in the background to the right. (Illinois.gov)
By Ted Cox
It’s a recommendation, not an order, but Illinoisans are being told to stay home for the next three weeks to slow a statewide surge in COVID-19 infections.
On a day when Gov. Pritzker and Dr. Ngozi Ezike did not hold a coronavirus briefing, due to Veterans Day, the Illinois Department of Public Health nonetheless made news Wednesday with its daily count of new COVID cases. Not only did the state set a new one-day record, with 12,657 newly confirmed cases of COVID-19, bringing the total to 523,840, but the department added that it “recommends” that citizens “stay home as much as possible, leaving only for necessary and essential activities, such as work that must be performed outside the home, COVID-19 testing, visiting the pharmacy, and buying groceries.”
Asking Illinoisans to observe the recommendations for the next three weeks, the department urged people to “work from home if possible,” and it asked employers to “make accommodation for this.” It also cited the latest advice from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to limit all travel and gatherings. “In our current situation, with a rising prevalence of the virus, attending even small gatherings that mix households, or traveling to areas that are experiencing high rates of positivity, is not advised and is potentially dangerous,” the news release stated. “Please, travel only if necessary.”
Anyone scoffing at the recommendations need only look at the latest COVID-19 death count in Illinois: 145 new deaths attributed to the coronavirus Wednesday, the most since May, to bring the state toll to 10,434. It was the sixth straight day registering more than 10,000 newly confirmed infections, and even as the state again conducted almost 100,000 tests the seven-day positivity rate rose to 12.4 percent. Hospitalizations for the coronavirus rose above 5,000 for the first time to 5,042.
Pritzker warned Tuesday that the pandemic was once again “on the cusp of going exponential” and that “an additional statewide action is possible” in imposing mitigation restrictions.