This is one in a series of Voices pieces by Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke. We’re calling it the Mayor’s Minute. Want to share your voice? You can contribute to NOOGAtoday here.
In the last several days, as parts of our community continue to reopen, we’ve seen more than 150 new positive confirmed COVID-19 cases as well as a rise in fatalities. While this rise in numbers can somewhat be correlated with an increase in testing, what is most concerning is our current positivity rate, which is at 8%. According to a New York Times article, this makes our city fifth in the nation for growing confirmed cases.
While we are reopening our community it’s important to remember that this virus is still very much active and impacting people we know and love. We have to slow that growth.
If we want to see our economy come back to where it was before this pandemic hit, we have to get public health right, which means a couple of things.
First, we all have to make an effort to care about each other. We have to care about the workers who have to interact with the public. We have to care about the people we pass in grocery aisles. And we have to care about vulnerable populations.
There are really simple ways to do this — wear a mask any time you’re in public, wash your hands, and stay home as much as possible. We know social distancing worked early on in this fight and these practices need to become part of our new normal.
Second, we need a true understanding of our local testing data. Expanding testing availability is a step in the right direction but every day, we need to know how many tests are being conducted, how many are negative, and where we’re seeing confirmed cases so we have a true look at our community’s positivity rate.
In Chattanooga, we’re fortunate to have so many free and available opportunities for residents to get a test from the Hamilton County Health Department to Cempa, Clinica Medicos and others. I’m grateful for their hard work in providing care for our community. I encourage everybody to please go get tested. You have every reason to do so, and no excuse not to. You can see a list of testing sites updated weekly at cha.city/covidtesting.
I know this has been a long and frustrating two months and people want to move on. Believe me, I do too, but I also know that we have a responsibility to each other and to the health of our community.
Please be safe and take care of each other.
