Michigan too now.
Maryland is now closed for business. Thank you for shopping with us. Come again!
(closing all bars, restaurants, movie theaters, and gyms starting at 5pm today)
Georgia has postponed it’s Presidential primary. Early voting had already started. (There are a few local races also on the ballot. E.g., we get to pick a couple county posts.)
So the parking lot at the park was nearly empty this morning. No water aerobics classes and the early voting was shut down.
Sorry folks, Canada is closed. Moose out front should have told ya.
My university just extended the online-only teaching plan through the end of the semester. Hopefully Zoom has the capacity to handle every college in North America using it to deliver classes.
Zoom, Vsee, Doxy, and others have been crashing at times today. Tough to get clients on board with telehealth when it’s overloaded!
Also we’re closing our residence halls, canceling all on-campus activities, and canceling commencement. :eek:
Nooooooo!!!
Illinois Gov. Pritzker, at least, is looking at ways of keeping kitchens open via delivery and curbside pickup.
In related news, the governor is also keeping student food programs going via delivery and pickup.
– and on a very local level, although we have no known local cases (yet), I no longer have planning board work meetings scheduled every week this month. We’d have been well under the 50 person level; but some of us are high risk.
Local bus service has been reduced; the county-run service is on a Saturday schedule and Metrobus is on their Saturday Supplemental schedule (i.e.: the one they use for July 4).
My bowling league is cancelled for the next two weeks. “So what?” you ask. Well, they are mostly rural Trump supporters who get their news from Facebook and feel this is all a Democrat hoax.
However, the bowling alley bar is closed, so that hurts.
And now the StL Zoo is closed, along with the Magic House (a very popular children’s science museum) and all St. Louis County Libraries.
ETA: And the Missouri Botanical Garden.
Today’s Primary voting in Ohio has been postponed. What’s gonna happen with the conventions this summer?
We should have a thread: “What is still open?”
Situation in Edinburgh, Scotland:
Closures: All sport is off. All theatres closed. Launch event for Edinburgh International Festival (scheduled for tomorrow) is off.
Still open: National museum, National gallery, Portrait gallery, Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh Castle, Edinburgh Zoo, schools, colleges. Pubs and restaurants are open, except Boris in his wisdom has told us not to go to them.
The American Society of Reproductive Medicine is the professional organization for infertility doctors. They’ve issued new guidance on how infertility practices should conduct business during the pandemic. The short answer is: they shouldn’t. ASRM calls for the suspension of most infertility treatment. There’s no legal force behind this, but most practices follow ASRM guidance. I think malpractice insurance for infertility practices often has rules saying that they won’t cover you if you deviate from ASRM guidance; and if you get sued and you’re found not to be following ASRM guidance, that’s a bad thing. So the rules are a big deal.
My wife is an infertility doc. So once she completes the current treatment cycle on her current patients, she’s basically out of work. We’re fortunate, or course, that we’ve had year to build up savings, and my job is relatively high paying and isn’t going away, so this isn’t going to send us into financial ruin. But it does definitely suck. The guidance from ASRM makes sense, and it’s probably the right thing to do for greater society. But it’s a bummer for us.
Kansas: most state offices closing from March 23 to April 5; K-12 schools closed to in-person instruction for remainder of school year. cite
We’re up to39 states + DC that have closed schools statewide, andin California (one of the remaining 11), nearly 99% of the schools are closed.
I think KS Gov. Kelly is right to go ahead and admit that the academic year’s already over. CA Gov. Newsom says they’ll probably have to do the same, and I bet these are just the first pebbles of the avalanche. Because a 2- or 3-week school closure just isn’t going to be enough, not by a long shot.
Better to admit that the year’s over, give seniors their diplomas, and take this time to start prepping for distance learning in the fall, in case it proves necessary - which is hardly unlikely.