As Arkansas COVID-19 instances improve, Sanders vows she received’t require masks, vaccinations

X, Sarah Sanders

August got here and went and left greater than 5,300 Arkansans sick with COVID-19. The instances reported to the Arkansas Division of Well being in August symbolize the third highest month-to-month case rely in 2023, behind January and February.

The ADH tracks the illness in a a lot totally different means than when the pandemic was in full swing. Now solely updating COVID-19 knowledge on a weekly basis, the numbers are onerous to check to earlier knowledge. Add in at-home exams and individuals who don’t go to the physician once they’re sick, and the numbers seemingly solely symbolize a portion of the folks really in poor health.

On Aug. 22, the ADH reported 2,185 COVID-19 instances and 44 hospitalizations had been recorded within the earlier seven days. Most Arkansas colleges introduced youngsters again on Aug. 14.

One of many first issues Gov. Sarah Sanders did when she took workplace was signal an govt order to “transfer past COVID.” Despite the latest improve in reported sicknesses, Sanders took to X, previously generally known as Twitter, Thursday to remind Arkansans that so long as she’s in cost, she received’t take precautionary measures like lockdowns and obligatory masking.

“Let me be clear,” she mentioned. “So long as I’m governor, Arkansas won’t ever lock down. We’ll by no means shut our colleges, church buildings or companies. We’ll by no means make you or your youngsters put on a masks. And we are going to by no means, ever have a COVID-19 vaccine mandate.”

Sanders continued to say the federal government shouldn’t loom over particular person liberties and if the feds make strikes to name for shutdowns, she’s going to struggle to maintain Arkansas “free.”

So long as I’m Governor, Arkansas is not going to lock down.
 
We is not going to shut colleges, church buildings, or companies.
 
And we is not going to have masks or COVID vaccine mandates. pic.twitter.com/nj4ONer122

— Sarah Huckabee Sanders (@SarahHuckabee) August 31, 2023

That is enterprise as standard for Sanders. Throughout her marketing campaign for governor, she ran commercials and social media posts essential of college shutdowns. Arkansas colleges had been shut down for under a few months through the pandemic and opened again up in August of 2020, regardless of ongoing objections from some medical specialists. Regardless, Sanders latched on to the divisive points of college closings and masks necessities that favored her conservative base.

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