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Texas’ surging coronavirus numbers will not slow the state’s reopening as Republican Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday instead prescribed an emphasis on face coverings and social distancing to curtail sobering trends, including hospitalization rates that have doubled since Memorial Day. Abbott did not announce any new measures to reverse what he called “unacceptable” trends as Texas reached an 11th consecutive day of record COVID-19 hospitalizations. And while he didn’t rule out reimposing lockdown orders in Texas — describing it as a last resort — he said the virus did not require choosing “between jobs and health.” He instead emphasized long-established voluntary measures, such as staying at home if possible. (Weber, 6/22)

Less than a week after he downplayed rising caseloads, citing abundant medical resources and anomalies in the data, the Republican governor struck a more urgent and exasperated tone, saying many of those not yet infected seem unwilling to wear masks or take other steps that are proven to slow the spread of the virus. Abbott declined, however, to step up statewide restrictions, pointing instead to local leaders for guidance. He threatened to take “additional measures” only if infections continue to rise. (Blackman, 6/22)

“Wearing a mask will help us to keep Texas open because not taking action to slow the spread will cause COVID to spread even worse, risking people’s lives, and ultimately leading to the closure of businesses,” [Abbott] said. The number of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations have been marching upward, including in Dallas County, since mid-June. On Monday the state reported that 3,711 people were in Texas hospitals with COVID-19 -- the most since the pandemic began and the 11th day of steady increase. (Morris, Barragan and Garrett, 6/22)

For weeks, even as Covid-19 cases have risen rapidly across this state, Friday night bull riding at the Buffalo Chip Saloon and Steakhouse has regularly drawn nearly 1,000 people—with few of them wearing masks, according to the owner of the sprawling restaurant and entertainment venue. As photos rocketing around the internet have shown, the same has been true at many restaurants and bars in the Phoenix region. For some people, it is a matter of personal freedom. Others argue that healthy people don’t need to wear masks, though public health experts warn that asymptomatic carriers can still spread the disease to others. (Caldwell, 6/22)

Darth Vader, the Minnesota Vikings and Mike Pence, who’s wearing a “Make America Great Again” face mask, walk into a bar. That may sound like the setup to a very funny (and perhaps risqué) joke, but it also hints at how to solve a deadly serious problem: getting more people — particularly the swaggeringly toxic mask-averse males of the species — to don face coverings in public to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus. (Tschorn, 6/22)

Business executives and front-line workers are pushing government officials to require customers to wear masks, a step that could allow companies to avoid alienating a portion of the public. As coronavirus cases surge around the U.S. following reopenings in numerous states, public-health experts and many in the broader public consider the face coverings essential for slowing the spread of the new coronavirus. An equally vocal group opposes mask requirements because they think they curtail personal liberty or for other reasons. (Sayre and Sider, 6/22)

When America first reported an alarming wave of coronavirus cases this year, police departments across the country swiftly raised alarm about a lack of masks and other equipment that would protect officers as they went about their essential jobs. “We just don’t have enough,” a spokesman for the Chicago Police Department complained in March about a shortage of personal protective equipment for officers. But in Chicago as well as in other cities across the nation, police officers have been seen doing their jobs in recent weeks without masks, even in places where officials have mandated they wear them and even in situations such as crowded protests over racial injustice and police abuse, in which social distancing is nearly impossible. (Searcey, Tompkins and Chiarito, 6/23)

Only 26 US states have publicly available guidelines for allocation of ventilators in a public health emergency such as the COVID-19 pandemic, and the advice they contain varies widely, according to a study published late last week in JAMA Cardiology. The investigators, from Rush University in Chicago and the University of Chicago, conducted a systematic review to determine if the lack of and variation in guidelines could lead to unfair allocation of potentially scarce ventilators and whether any guidelines suggested using unique criteria for pediatric patients. (Van Beusekom, 6/22)