# Am I missing something here? (re: reopening of bars, etc... now) **URL:** \ **Category:** The Quarantine Zone\ **Tags:** covid-quarantine\ **Created:** [October 6, 2020, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356 "2020-10-06T17:27:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 49
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/961 "2020-12-24T14:16:50Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > This year is the first in my lifetime I’ve seen mask mandates, mass school and business closings, or even much in the way of social distancing. We haven’t (since 1918) had any pandemic that would have called for such measures-this is the first time. That’s why you haven’t seen it. If there had been a flu season with a sufficiently dangerous new strain of flu then public health measures would have largely been what you are seeing for the SARS CoV 2. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/962 "2020-12-24T14:41:28Z")
Also, with flu, they would have been more targeted and better informed, because we know a lot about flu. We don’t know much about COVID, relatively, and were deeply unprepared, so yes, we’ve probably done things that were unproductive or even counterproductive. That’s just part of dealing with an bunch of unknown unknowns. And yes, it ramps the cost of dealing with the situation way up. That’s just how this natural disaster is playing out. When your house is flooding you don’t wait for the engineers to run 50 models to tell you where to put the sandbags. You make your best guess and go from there. In retrospect, it may not be the optimal placement, but you don’t have the luxury of time. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/963 "2020-12-24T15:41:45Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > like opening one’s eyes to the very clear patterns of peaks and declines over the course of four to eight weeks that appear…well, pretty much everywhere. You mean the 4 to 8 week cycles of tightening up, stats declining, then opening back up, and stats rising? Is there some other 4 to 8 week cycle? > [@SayTwo](#): > > There’s not a town with a Costco that isn’t having more of its citizens frequent shopping centers during the day than bars at midnight. This is such a ridiculous comparison I can’t believe it was typed out. At Costco, people are largely wearing masks, they are moving about, and they don’t stay there for hours at a time. Staff and customers are masking, with some other physical barriers at key places like registers. Bars, people are unmasked - so they can eat and drink. Bars, people are socializing, getting close to each other, mingling, dancing, maybe even kissing. Bars, people are _getting drunk_. Are you aware that two of the biggest effects of getting drunk are losing control of inhibitions and losing judgement? The two things needed to maintain social distancing, masking, and other behavioral controls. And people tend to hang out in bars for far longer than a shopping trip. Add in that some of these bars are dance clubs, where people are not just sitting or walking, but dancing hard and singing - things that increase breathing strength and frequency. And most significantly, which you completely ignore, is that people _have_ to have groceries. Going to a bar and getting drunk is optional. > [@SayTwo](#): > > I’m not sure that’s either here or there, but one thing I do imagine is that those who want to get up close with someone and make out (or worse!) will find a way to do it, before or after 10 pm and inside a public place or not. Again, this is bizarro. Yeah, sure, people can Tinder or internet or whatever to arrange hookups if that’s what they want to do. How does that justify keeping social venues open? People can decide to drive drunk if they want, doesn’t mean we encourage it. > [@SayTwo](#): > > It should be very patently obvious that two people sitting together in a restaurant are doing nothing demonstrably ‘riskier’ than they would be sitting in a home together or out shopping. That depends. Are they masked at home, or are they unmasked? Are they masked shopping, or unmasked? Are they from the same household, or from different ones? Are they eating and drinking? And most significantly, how many other people are around them in their home doing the same thing? If the restaurant has three tables open spread with 10 feet between them, and there are 2 guests at each table, and each table is engaged in eating, drinking, and talking - typically loudly (do I need to justify that?), how much air circulation is there in the room between the tables? How long is the air lingering? Those are factors that won’t be present if just 2 people are sitting in one of their living rooms six feet apart. > [@SayTwo](#): > > take a packed house of club-goers on other end (though presumably less risky if it’s before closing time) It is equally risky if the club is full day or night all other things being equal. What differs is the likelihood of the club being packed goes up at night, and the later at night the more likely it is true. Also, drinking escalates at night, so judgement goes down and riskier behavior ensues. This is common sense to anyone who has tried having their social club-going earlier in the night. They find that the crowds don’t show up then. ---
**Author:** ![FigNorton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fignorton/32/5619_2.png) [@FigNorton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FigNorton)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/964 "2020-12-24T16:14:00Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > Bars, people are _getting drunk_ . I expect Saytwo will require some studies showing people get drunk in bars. ---
**Author:** ![Ziberian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/919ad9/32.png) [@Ziberian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ziberian)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/965 "2020-12-24T16:54:37Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > I’m afraid I’m not following you here. This year is the first in my lifetime I’ve seen mask mandates, mass school and business closings, or even much in the way of social distancing. I’m not sure I even can think of isolated school or business closures. If those were routine for influenza or anything else in other parts of the country, then I guess I was blissfully unaware. You are certainly unaware – school closures due to disease outbreaks have been common forever. A quick Google search brings up numerous stories just in recent years. Just a couple recent examples: [Flu Outbreak Closes Schools in Four U.S. States | The Weather Channel](https://weather.com/health/cold-flu/news/2019-02-06-flu-cdc-alabama-schools-closed) [Cincinnati schools close after over 1000 kids get the flu](https://nypost.com/2020/02/01/multiple-cincinnati-schools-close-after-over-1000-kids-catch-the-flu/) [More schools shut down because of flu outbreak](https://www.fox4news.com/news/more-schools-shut-down-because-of-flu-outbreak) ---
**Author:** ![Ziberian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/919ad9/32.png) [@Ziberian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ziberian)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/966 "2020-12-24T17:18:37Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > So to answer your question, what it would take in this case is for people to start dying in a _distribution_ that differs markedly from that of ‘natural’ rates of death, meaning that which we have observed for some time and come to expect. What seems to be the case with COVID is that a given person’s chances of dying if they contract it are not markedly different from their (statistical, I mean, at a population level) chances of dying if they don’t. (To see this you can look at an age stratum and observe the percentage who die from COVID with the percentage who die of any cause in a given year.) But people have been dying in abnormal distributions in places like nursing homes & prisons since the beginning of COVID in the US. Obviously that hasn’t alarmed people such as you. In fact, these clusters have been used to argue that NPI restrictions aren’t necessary for the general population. It seems there are no actual facts that you will accept. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/967 "2020-12-24T17:53:08Z")
> [@Ziberian](#): > > But people have been dying in abnormal distributions in places like nursing homes & prisons since the beginning of COVID in the US. Obviously that hasn’t alarmed people such as you. In fact, these clusters have been used to argue that NPI restrictions aren’t necessary for the general population. It seems there are no actual facts that you will accept. No, I do not believe that they have. In fact, it’s the very reason that they have _not_ that keeps me from undue alarm. I have no idea what actual facts you think I’m ignoring, because I’ve seen the facts, again and again and again. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/968 "2020-12-24T17:56:21Z")
> [@FigNorton](#): > > I expect Saytwo will require some studies showing people get drunk in bars. The studies that would justify the closures would be not ones that show people get drunk in bars but rather ones that show closing bars results in significantly reduced incidence of disease in the community. If you or @Irishman cannot grasp the difference, then I don’t know if I can help you. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/969 "2020-12-24T18:04:28Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > Again, this is bizarro. Yeah, sure, people can Tinder or internet or whatever to arrange hookups if that’s what they want to do. How does that justify keeping social venues open? People can decide to drive drunk if they want, doesn’t mean we encourage it. You really do come at this from some odd angles. You think a claim that young people who are sexually attracted to each other might find a way to get together even if the bars are closed is bizarre? Man, I wonder what your youth must have been like. I guess the way you said ‘justify keeping social venues open’ says it all, really. My claim was that if the justification for closing them is that it will keep people from kissing (or worse!), then that justification is based on a very faulty premise. But even if it weren’t, why does any entity need to justify its very existence in the name of public health? The burden of proof goes the other way. Or at least it damn well should. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2020, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/970 "2020-12-24T19:27:53Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > The studies that would justify the closures would be not ones that show people get drunk in bars but rather ones that show closing bars results in significantly reduced incidence of disease in the community. If you or @Irishman cannot grasp the difference, then I don’t know if I can help you. :sigh: Again. > **[Community and Close Contact Exposures Associated with COVID-19 ...](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6936a5.htm)** > > Community and close contact exposures continue to drive the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. CDC and other public health authorities recommend community mitigation strategies ... > **What is added by this report?** > > Findings from a case-control investigation of symptomatic outpatients from 11 U.S. health care facilities found that close contact with persons with known COVID-19 or going to locations that offer on-site eating and drinking options were associated with COVID-19 positivity. Adults with positive SARS-CoV-2 test results were approximately twice as likely to have reported dining at a restaurant than were those with negative SARS-CoV-2 test results. ---
**Author:** ![eenerms](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cdc98d/32.png) [@eenerms](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eenerms)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/971 "2020-12-25T01:22:22Z")
Do people really think that restaurants/bars want their customers to get infected? I my observations the restaurants and bars around here have complied with all rules. Even during a pandemic the constitution is still in force. People are beginning to push back. Thankfully I’m not still in the business. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/972 "2020-12-25T01:52:45Z")
> [@eenerms](#): > > Do people really think that restaurants/bars want their customers to get infected? I don’t think the study said that, it is clear that they remarked on the most likely implication, there are a number of customers that lie about not being infected or likely sick with corona so as to get into the restaurants. As for people pushing back, obviously the _ **few** _ that do are the ones that do not understand about who are the “friends” that advice them to drop masks and curfews. [In reality, they are not about freedom, but about anarchy.](https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2020/08/10/kenneth-lougee-mask/) ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/973 "2020-12-25T02:10:03Z")
> [@eenerms](#): > > Do people really think that restaurants/bars want their customers to get infected? Want? No. Don’t seem to particularly care? Many. > [@eenerms](#): > > I my observations the restaurants and bars around here have complied with all rules. [R](https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/coronavirus/article247961740.html).[E](https://austin.eater.com/2020/12/22/22195908/austin-public-health-list-bars-with-covid-19-violations-citations).[A](https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-cuomo-announces-36-additional-establishments-liquor-licenses-suspended-egregious).[L](https://www.tampabay.com/news/health/2020/12/19/tampa-bay-bars-and-restaurants-feel-sting-of-coronavirus-enforcement/).[L](https://www.nj.com/coronavirus/2020/11/nj-authorities-cite-15-bars-restaurants-for-covid-19-rule-violations-more-inspections-planned.html).[Y](https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article243769447.html).[?](https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/another-round-of-restaurant-bar-shutdowns-following-covid-violations-in-ft-lauderdale/2257781/) [Been hanging out](https://www.gannett-cdn.com/presto/2020/06/23/USAT/ff6f6b0e-97bf-4591-85a5-865c5201ccde-Handlebar_houston.jpeg?crop=1199,675,x0,y111&width=1199&height=675&format=pjpg&auto=webp) at [the popular bars](https://www.sun-sentinel.com/resizer/St9Jo8eLpuRQAzzN5TKBIWbKTUM=/800x800/top/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/tronc/S43LHVVM5JGXBL3OWQ272YWZWA.jpg) and [restaurants lately](https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2020/05/11/coronavirus-restaurant-coffee-colorado_wide-8de53fd94346527a361420c2381186a967dddec7.jpg?s=1400)? > [@eenerms](#): > > Even during a pandemic the constitution is still in force. People are beginning to push back. I have no idea what you are trying to say here, as of course the constitution is in effect during a pandemic. Care to elaborate? > [@eenerms](#): > > Thankfully I’m not still in the business. We’re in total agreement. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/974 "2020-12-25T02:26:56Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As for people pushing back, obviously the _ **few** _ that do are the ones that do not understand about who are the “friends” that advice them to drop masks and curfews. [In reality, they are not about freedom, but about anarchy.](https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2020/08/10/kenneth-lougee-mask/) In reality, eh, and not just in that one person’s opinion? Or they definitely are because of some language the Supreme Court used about a smallpox vaccine? I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the connection between that language then and facemasks now has not necessarily been made. Or at least, not by those who live outside a certain narrow ‘reality’. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/975 "2020-12-25T03:02:55Z")
To call that CDC report less than ironclad would still be generous. For one thing, if we’re to consider it then we must also consider the multitude of other reports that have not found restaurants to be significant sources of spread. Repeatability, remember. Science insists upon it. And for good reason, too, else you might draw strong inferences from weak data. Let’s look a little closer at this report. You get headline-level stuff about ‘bars/coffee shops’ in addition to restaurants, and do you know on the basis of what data? A whopping 21 people – 13 with positive tests and 8 without. That’s how many reported visiting a bar or restaurant in the two weeks before the onset of symptoms. Now, those aren’t the kinds of numbers I’d take to the bank. But somehow they were able to restrict the analysis to those without reported close contacts of someone positive (and who knows what else) and arrive at a conclusion – or at least a conclusion that it wouldn’t seem to hurt if the public reached on their own – that you are 3.9 times more likely to contract the disease if you visit a bar or coffee shop than you are if you don’t. For restaurants, in case you don’t want to click and dig in, it was 63 people, for 41% among those with positive test results, who went to at least one and 44 people, for 28% of those with negative test results, who didn’t. In the same group, for shopping it was 131 positive people (86%) and 141 negative (88%). The groups seemed equally likely to risk exposure at salons (negatives actually lead here, 18 percent to 16), home gatherings with more than ten people (again the negatives, at 15 percent to 14), offices (negatives with 30 percent to 24), and gyms and public transport. Somewhat interesting to me, churchgoers were 12 to 8 for the positives, almost the exact same numbers as for bars/coffee shops! So, I don’t know if the conclusion from all that is that the bars and coffee shops were to blame. Myself, I’d be skeptical. As for masks, both groups reported very high compliance, with positives at 85 percent and negatives at 89 for either ‘often’ or ‘always’. The p-value on mask use is .86, but I certainly don’t see any headlines here claiming that masks provided no benefit to the wearer. Also nothing about home gatherings with more than ten people being demonstrably safe. Or salons. Or gyms. Do you see what I’m getting at? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/976 "2020-12-25T03:28:55Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > Do you see what I’m getting at? I only see a declaration that more studies support you, but no evidence. There is a thing you can do, go to the CDC and explain how wrong they are. Mind you, what I quoted was corrected recently, so what you think supports you was very likely already considered and not as good and you think. I will wait. In the meantime, I will trust them more than your un-sourced opinion. ---
**Author:** ![SayTwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e56c9b/32.png) [@SayTwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SayTwo)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/977 "2020-12-25T03:34:23Z")
I’m not asking you to support me. I’m asking you to think critically and for yourself. I don’t think the CDC has been a shining bastion of infallibility throughout all this. And I think they would be the very, very first ones to tell you if later on they decided to change their views. I think it is a mistake for you to take one study they release, and a relatively small and low-powered one at that, and take the headline as some sort of secular dogma without looking at the internals and asking if the conclusions align with what you yourself have learned about the world and how it works. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/978 "2020-12-25T03:37:17Z")
> [@SayTwo](#): > > I’m not asking you to support me. I’m asking you to think critically and for yourself. I have done it several times already, you come up short always, like now when you can not produce a cite that would support you (and this is about using logic) with the implied idea that bars could be safer. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/979 "2020-12-25T03:53:18Z")
BTW It is not only one doctor or epidemiologist the one coming with that CDC study, what I have found about how the world works is that when most experts tell you something (that points to a consensus) that then other evidence (with different methods to get evidence even) is very, very likely to be available elsewhere to show that bars and other places can be locations of super spreader events. > **[Restaurants and gyms were spring ‘superspreader’ sites. Occupancy limits...](https://www.statnews.com/2020/11/10/restaurants-gyms-were-spring-superspreader-sites-occupancy-limits-could-control-spread/)** > > Sharply limiting the occupancy of restaurants, gyms, cafes, hotels, and houses of worship could control the raging pandemic without resorting to lockdowns, a new study suggests. > Using cellphone data from 1 in 3 Americans, researchers have identified the indoor public places most responsible for the spread of Covid-19 in the spring, and they argue that sharply limiting the occupancy of these locales — chiefly restaurants, gyms, cafes, hotels, and houses of worship — could control the raging pandemic without resorting to lockdowns. > > Their [analysis also explains](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2923-3) how disparities in risk contribute to the disproportionate disease burden borne by people of color who have been less able than higher-income white people to work remotely and who tend to visit grocery stores and other places that tend to be smaller and more crowded than those in white neighborhoods. > > “It corresponds to what we thought from the beginning, that there are certain activities that lead to spread more than other activities,” said Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security who was not involved in the study. “When you are thinking of targeted public health interventions, it’s important to focus on those activities where that’s occurring and not being overly blunt and blocking and stopping all activities that may not necessarily have been a major contributor to spread.” ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2020, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356/980 "2020-12-25T15:33:48Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > We hit 300,000 deaths on Dec. 14, ahead of my prediction. Worldometers has us at 315,000 deaths today. At 2,900 daily deaths for 8 days gives 23,200 more deaths by Christmas Day, or 338,200 total deaths. I just checked Worldometers. We hit 337,081 total deaths and it’s 9 am central. How’s that for a prediction? > [@SayTwo](#): > > Broward County’s rules, prohibiting the sale or alcohol between midnight and 5 a.m., violate the governor’s order and are “speculative and arbitrary,” wrote U.S. District Judge Raag Singhal of the Southern District of Florida. I was looking for the decision to get more details on the Judge’s determination, but I can’t find it. The [main determination](https://www.miaminewtimes.com/restaurants/broward-county-florida-bars-curfew-federal-judge-overturns-rules-11782313) of the ruling is his decision that the curfew violates the Governor’s order. > [@](#): > > Singhal found that the restrictions violated Gov. Ron DeSantis’ September mandate that “no COVID-19 emergency ordinance may prevent an individual from working or from operating a business.” > > The judge called Broward’s restrictions “arbitrary” and said the county had not presented enough evidence to show that banning late-night drinking at bars had a measurable effect on the COVID outbreak. That does speak to the point, but without seeing what, if any, evidence was presented, it really is hard to evaluate the basis of that judgement. > [@](#): > > In the court proceedings, Broward’s lawyers had argued that the county rules did not conflict with DeSantis’ order because they did not outright close bars during the midnight-to-5-a.m. restriction period. > > But the judge was unswayed. Singhal stated that Broward bars “cannot effectively stay open if prohibited from serving food and drink.” He issued a temporary restraining order against the county on Monday. > > Geller says the ruling leaves the door open for the county to reinstate its rules upon presenting more evidence of their effectiveness and a breakdown of their economic impact. Basically, the judge said the Governor’s mandate overrides local jurisdictions, and set a high bar for overturning that. Also, his determination is in conflict with a different State Appellate Court ruling that upheld a Miami Dade County curfew on the exact same grounds. This is hardly a determination of science. It’s a legal policy dispute. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356.md?page=48) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-missing-something-here-re-reopening-of-bars-etc-now/922356.md?page=50)