Another Spring Break—with an outbreak of the Covid virus

By Steve Otto

Leave it to the people of Florida to do things wrong. Every year kids from across the country come down to Miami Beach for fun and sun. The fun includes everything from heaving drinking to sexual naughtiness (see Girls Gone Wild).

It's a partiers dream come true--until this year.

This year we are still in a pandemic for that covid virus. Florida is a very conservative state overall. And we all know that conservatives, at least some of them, don't like the government forcing them to wear masks in public.

Florida does have its share of anti-mask protesters. Just a few months ago "Cindy Falco-DiCorrado, 62, of Boynton Beach,refused to cover her face inside an Einstein Bros. Bagels at 9795 Glades Road. She shouted at customers and employees about her right to stay mask-free and refused to leave the store, leading deputies to arrest her on a trespassing charge, according to a Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office report."

But right now, the authorities in Miami Beach are not happy with the un-masked partiers trying to have fun in the streets of that part of Florida. According to Yahoo News:

"Miami Beach has declared a state of emergency in its entertainment district due to an influx of spring breakers who have inundated the city. A curfew will be in effect at 8 p.m. for 72 hours, starting Saturday, Miami Beach Interim City Manager Raul Aguila announced Saturday.

All restaurants, bars and businesses are required to be closed by 8 p.m.

"As we hit the peak – at the peak of spring break, we are quite simply overwhelmed in the entertainment district," Aguila said at a press conference Saturday. "Folks, this is not an easy decision to make, we are doing that to protect the public health and safety."

A number of things have fed into this event—this problem. One is that the pandemic has lasted now since last March and a lot of people are getting frayed nerves as we all have to put up with the isolation that has come with being forced to "stay home" for nearly every event and every holiday. It has been hard for all of us to deal with. Then there is the anti-mask crowed who have done everything possible to defy all the  attempts to close down businesses and they have defied the orders to wear a mask. They are standing up for what they think is there rights. There are also those who have called the pandemic a farce, a phony problem of a disease they claim does not really exist. These same people are encouraging people not to take the vaccine.

Another part of the problem is that young people do need to let off steam now and then. They need a break. They need to party. Maybe the problem was not to stop them from having a spring break party, maybe it would have been better to find a way for them to party and not cause trouble. It may have been possible to control the partying rather than just shutting it down.

Any way we look at it, for now, Spring Break in Miami Beach is a disaster. There is no social distancing and no mask wearing. We can prepare for more cases of Covid and more deaths.

This whole thing was probably a problem no matter what the police did. But it could have been handled better and the anti-mask, anti-vaccine conservatives have contributed to the pandemic. They have contributed to the deaths.

This is one spring break many will try and forget. But it won't be easy.