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MIAMI (WSVN) - Stay at home orders have been in place throughout the state for weeks, but Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is working with experts to create a plan to reopen the state.
On Thursday, DeSantis held four teleconferences with the Re-Open Florida Task Force.
“What we’ve seen is our percent of tests positive was never really high to begin with, which was a good thing, but it’s definitely trended down,” DeSantis said.
People from many different organizations across the state participated in the conference call with the governor. Those individuals are working on a plan to get the state back to business, which will mean new rules and regulations for everyone to help prevent the spread.
“I can tell you that many, many of our growers are temperature testing, especially those in packing houses,” Mike Joyner, the president of the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association, said.
Hospitals may be required to have units or floors exclusively for COVID-19 patients. The measure is another step to stop the virus’ spread as medical professionals get back to elective surgeries and procedures when the executive order expires on May 8.
“Hospitals need to anticipate what I would call a potential second wave or a potential bump in cases as we ease restrictions,” Tampa General Hospital President and CEO John Couris said.
The governor is using criteria from President Trump’s guidelines as well as taking an in-depth assessment of Florida’s COVID-19 cases.
“As you’re looking at the White House’s guidelines, clearly we’ve had a two-week decline in the influenza-like illness indicators,” he said during one of the conference calls. “Then you look at the declining cases, we hit our peak on April 3 for new cases. It’s trended down, plateaued and then trended down.”
The meetings come after several protests were held over the weekend for a reopening of the government.
Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez has defended his decision to begin the process to reopen the county.
“We’ve seen the trend flatten out,” Gimenez said. “We’ve seen it going down, and it’s time for us to start reopening in a safe way. Look, I’m a paramedic, OK? I think I know a little bit about what we’re doing here.”
Gimenez added that his plan to reopen the county has a lot of input from medical and infectious disease experts.
The first phase of Miami-Dade County’s reopening will include parks, golf courses and boat ramps. Those places are expected to be open around next week with social distancing-related restrictions.
“That’s the key to the whole thing,” Gimenez said. “You have to enforce the rules. The first thing we’re doing right now is we’re adding additional personnel to make sure that we enforce the rules.”
Meanwhile, a new coronavirus pandemic study from the University of Washington has pushed the suggested date for easing social distancing restrictions until after June 14. The date will only apply if there is continued work to ramp up testing and contact tracing.
The task force will have four meetings on Friday when they continue to discuss reopening the state as quickly as possible.
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