SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah lawmaker says government needs to admit it overreacted to the coronavirus pandemic and “completely” reopen the state.
Rep. Paul Ray, R-Clearfield, also said he’s drafting legislation to prohibit local health departments from “unilaterally” quarantining healthy people and closing down the economy. He said it’s time to stop closing businesses and putting undue regulations and restrictions on residents.
“It’s time to stop letting panic and fear drive our policy. We need to open Utah and allow people to make their own decisions. Encourage compromised individuals to isolate, but don’t bankrupt everyone else,” he wrote in a lengthy Facebook post.
Utah businesses started reopening Friday as Gov. Gary Herbert shifted the state from “red,” or high risk, to “orange,” or moderate risk, though populations most vulnerable to COVID-19 remain at the red level. The state now limits gatherings to no more than 20 people and calls for social distancing and wearing masks in public places.
Ray, a COVID-19 Community Task Force member who opposed closing businesses and schools, said Utah needs to move to “green” and let people choose for themselves to go out or not.
“I’ve met with a lot of doctors, a lot of health guys that say we should save every life. Well, that’s not our job as a government. Our job is to balance things and let people make their own decisions, and we can’t save everybody. That’s something we just can’t do,” he said in an interview.
Ray’s Facebook post drew a swift rebuke from the Alliance for a Better Utah, a left-leaning public policy advocacy group.
“Rep. Ray doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about. Politicians should know when to take a back seat and listen to the experts — it is precisely because Utah listened to the experts that we have been able to prevent mass spread of the virus,” said Lauren Simpson, Better Utah policy director.
While the whole community is hurting right now, the wrong move would be to ignore the guidance of epidemiologists and infectious disease specialists, she said.
Herbert and Dr. Angela Dunn, state epidemiologist, have repeatedly said data is driving Utah’s policy decisions.
Simpson said everyone has a role to play in making sure the state is successful in fighting the virus, especially elected officials and leaders.
“We hope Rep. Ray will stop downplaying the crisis at this critical juncture and instead lead by listening to the experts,” she said.
Ray, a member and former chairman of the Utah House Health and Human Services Committee, said he recalls state and local health department officials saying during the 2009 swine flu pandemic it would not be appropriate to quarantine anyone who was not ill and that power would be only used for people who tested positive for the disease.
“I am furious, having been told several years ago that no healthy individual would be forced into quarantine, only to have it happen during the very next pandemic,” he wrote.
One local health department director shouldn’t have the ability to shut down an entire county without deliberating with a city council or county commission, he said.
Ray said he wants to take the summer to talk about drafting a bill for the 2021 legislative session. He said he’s not trying to undermine health directors.
“But at the same time, they have one focus and that’s health. They have zero focus on the economy,” he said.
The shutdown, Ray said, is killing businesses, noting the Utah Restaurant Association estimates 25% of eateries in the state will never reopen.
“The best stimulus package we can give is to open our businesses up and let them revive the economy. It won’t cost the taxpayers a dime,” he said.
In his Facebook post, Ray compares influenza and COVID-19 cases and deaths as reported by the Utah Department of Health.
Flu numbers, he said, are underestimated due to lack of reporting capabilities as deaths aren’t even typically tracked, unlike COVID-19, which is “hyper-reported.”