The White House, under pressure to escalate national action to combat the coronavirus, urged Americans on Wednesday to avoid gatherings of more than 10 people and called for closing bars, restaurants and other venues in states where local virus transmission exists.
But President Donald Trump refrained from ordering sweeping public quarantines, lockdowns or curfews for the time being, even as some state and local authorities independently imposed mandatory restrictions on eateries, movie theaters and other places of leisure in a bid to contain the respiratory virus.
“We’re recommending things,” Trump told a White House news conference in issuing new coronavirus guidelines. “We haven’t gone to that step yet” of ordering a lockdown. “That could happen, but we haven’t gone there yet.”
Trump also said he felt that postponements of primary elections, like those announced in Ohio, Georgia, Louisiana and Kentucky, were generally unnecessary. Ohio governor Mike DeWine said on Twitter his administration was ordering polls closed on Tuesday in defiance of a state court ruling to the contrary.
The number of known coronavirus infections and deaths in the US has paled in comparison with hot spots of the global pandemic, such as China, Italy or Iran. But the tally of confirmed US cases has multiplied quickly over the past few weeks, surpassing 4,600.
