It’s a question confronting public officials at all levels of government – as well as citizens and business owners, who have the God-given and constitutionally-protected right to freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom to petition for redress of grievances, etc.
As American citizens, we also have the right – the duty, even – to challenge or defy the edicts of public officials when they seem to be arbitrary or capricious, or to be infringing on our freedoms. This is the right that Dallas salon owner Shelley Luther asserted when she decided to keep her business open despite the stay-at-home order, only to find herself held in contempt of court and slapped with a prison sentence and an exorbitant fine.
Fortunately for Luther, the Texas Supreme Court ordered Dallas County officials to release her pending an appeal of her sentencing and Gov. Greg Abbott amended his COVID-19 executive order to “eliminate confinement as a punishment for violating the order.”
We are now learning that the lockdown orders recommended by Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx were influenced by the wildly inaccurate modeling that forms the basis of the Imperial College Study.
Like climate change models, epidemiological models are projections necessarily dependent on incomplete data and subject to willful or inadvertent misinterpretation. It’s beginning to look more and more like the “cure” may have been worse than the disease and may in fact have exacerbated the situation.
Nevertheless, we are where we are, and the question remains: When to open?
Which raises a second question for our litigious society: What will be the legal repercussions for business owners and others for arguably opening too soon or too late?
“I think there should be less emphasis on COVID-19 liability and more emphasis on public health,” says Beaumont lawyer Paul “Chip” Ferguson. “If businesses follow the directives of our public health officials, I think liability is unlikely.”
Some trial attorneys are already looking for ways to exploit this crisis. If only we could vaccinate ourselves against them.