One of the grimmest symbols of the coronavirus outbreak — a morgue set up in a Madrid skating rink — closed on Wednesday as stores and other businesses reopened in places across Europe, while the U.S. was beset with increasingly partisan disagreements over how and when to restart its economy.
As some governors in the U.S. — largely Republican ones — moved to reopen an ever-wider variety of businesses, others took a more cautious approach and came under mounting pressure from protesters complaining that their livelihoods are being destroyed and their freedom of movement is being infringed on.
With the crisis easing but far from over in Europe, small shops in Berlin reopened, and restrictions were also relaxed in Denmark and Austria. In France, long lines formed outside the few McDonald’s drive-thrus that started serving customers again. Still, many employees and customers were uneasy, suggesting that a return to normal is a long way off.
“Of course I’m happy that I can open again and we can keep our heads above water,” said Galina Hooge, who opened her small Berlin toy store for the first time in over a month. But she worried that some Germans still aren’t taking the outbreak seriously.
“Relaxing the rules doesn’t mean that everything is over. It’s not over by a long stretch,” she said. German government spokesman Steffen Seibert said “very careful steps” must be taken to keep the virus from making a resurgence. “What we want to avoid is falling back into the exponential spread of the virus that we had in the first phase of the pandemic,” he said. Across the Atlantic in Savannah, Georgia, where Gov. Brian Kemp announced that gyms and salons can reopen this week, gym owner Mark Lebos said it would be professional negligence to do so right now.