SC Gov. McMaster not planning shelter-in-place rule as local leaders weigh order

Although S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster on Wednesday continued to resist calls by some to order citizens to shelter in place, other elected leaders in South Carolina and around the U.S. are taking that drastic action to fight the spread of the coronavirus.

In Charleston, the city council passed a sweeping ordinance effective Thursday for all people to “stay in their homes and not travel through or congregate in the streets, sidewalks...and/or public spaces” except for those out on essential business.

In Columbia, where city officials have enacted a curfew, closed parks and urged people to work from home, Mayor Steven Benjamin announced that Thursday afternoon, the city council will consider enacting its own stay-at-home measures.

“We will probably model it on Charleston’s,” Benjamin said. “We are seeing a precipitous increase in the number of verified cases in South Carolina.”

Around the nation, governors and mayors have announced restrictions of varying degrees on peoples’ movements.

North Carolina’s Mecklenburg County, which includes the Carolinas’ largest city of Charlotte, population 859,000, passed an emergency measure directing all businesses and government agencies to stop nonessential operations and restrict nonessential gatherings. All public and private gatherings of more than 10 people are banned.

In California, a particularly hard-hit state, Gov. Gavin Newsom closed most retail outlets and ordered nearly everyone in the state, with a population of 40 million, to stay at home except for trips out for medicine, food or exercise.

In all, more than a dozen states — not including South Carolina — have directed their citizens to stay at home, according to the New York Times. Directives by counties and cities, as well as states, cover 191 million people in all, The Times reported.

Coronavirus is so dangerous because it spreads so easily from person to person and can be fatal, especially among the elderly and people with underlying health conditions. Since March 1, there were fewer than 100 confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States and only two deaths, Late Wednesday afternoon, there were 62,086 cases in the U.S. and nearly 900 deaths, to Johns Hopkins University.

In South Carolina, the number has gone from two possible cases reported on March 6 by state health officials to 424 confirmed cases on Wednesday. On March 16, South Carolina announced its first coronavirus death. Six more had died by Tuesday, according to the S.C. Department of Health and Control.

Since March 13, when Gov. McMaster declared a state of emergency and closed schools in two counties, Kershaw and Lancaster, the governor has slowly ramped up his responses as the threat from coronavirus increased.

On March 15, McMaster announced he was closing all S.C. public schools through March. His order affected 780,000 students in 1,250 schools.

On Tuesday, McMaster ordered all schools to remain closed through April. He also banned public gatherings of three or more people.

McMaster also has repeatedly urged other steps, including recommending that people stay six feet apart and calling for people in government and business to work from home if they can. He has banned restaurants and bars from serving customers in house.

But the governor has stopped short of the sweeping kind of order that would even more severely restrict movement.

On Wednesday, spokesman Brian Symmes said the governor has no immediate plans to order further measures but said the governor is monitoring the situation and could take further action if necessary.

“He has taken decisive action and given clear guidance,” Symmes said. “Every step of the way the governor has made these recommendations and issued these orders based on the recommendations, data and facts provided to him by the public health experts in the state.”

He continued: “The governor has faith in South Carolinians and believes they follow these directions and believes will take appropriate action and act responsibly.”

If the governor’s public health experts say further action is necessary, then that is what he’ll do,” Symmes said.

While avoiding saying that the governor is not doing enough, Benjamin said he will tell city council, “We need to do more. People are leading on the local level, and we need state and federal leadership.”

University of South Carolina scientist James Morris, who in Wednesday’s State newspaper predicted an explosion in South Carolina coronavirus cases, said the governor should do more than what he has done to date.

“We don’t want to get to where New York is before we take more action,” said Morris, citing the thousands of cases in the New York City area that are swamping that city’s health care system. “New York is a disaster.”

The range of views on what steps to take is not just between people who are urging stronger action now and those, such as McMaster, who have already taken action but - for the present - aren’t going to do more.

In Washington, President Donald Trump said Tuesday he would like to see churches “packed” with people on Easter and it is important for people to be out and about and businesses to be open again because the economy and stock market are being hit by coronavirus fears.

But Trump’s view has been criticized by many scientists and even church officials, who are persuaded by the studies showing how easily the disease spreads when people congregate together and how those stricken can overwhelm the health care system.

On Wednesday, state health officials released a predictive model for how coronavirus would spread in the state. State epidemiologist Linda Bell said she expects the state to have 8,000 cases of the coronavirus by May 2 and more than 2,600 by April 2.

On a conference call with reporters, Bell said South Carolinians “must get better” at following the guidance from state officials on practicing social distancing and proper hygiene to slow the disease’s spread — a strategy health leaders say will prevent health care systems from being overwhelmed.