Protest against COVID restrictions planned for Greater Morristown, Nov. 22

Morris County Surrogate Heather Darling, Election Night 2019. Photo by Kevin Coughlin
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By Marion Filler

As COVID numbers rise, Gov. Phil Murphy isn’t ruling out another statewide shutdown. A group calling itself We the People NJ is planning a peaceful protest in Greater Morristown this Sunday, Nov. 22, 2020, to express its concern.

The origin of the organization is unclear. After attending a pro-business rally in Randolph for tennis center owner Jennifer Rogers, Morris County Surrogate Heather Darling said she was asked to represent a similar constituency in Morristown.

“There is a group of individuals who is working to keep businesses open, and doing a march to ask the governor to keep the state open and not have such great lockdown restrictions this time through,” Darling said Thursday.

She has agreed to represent the group, whose members she declined to name.

“It’s a difficult time with people on edge with COVID and politics and every other thing,” said Darling, a Republican who formerly served as a Morris County Freeholder.  Although these individuals will participate in the march, “they wish to remain anonymous in light of today’s somewhat….how shall I say it…difficult time… in order to protect their families.”

The march will start at 10 am at the Morris Township police department and terminate at Morristown town hall at noon. Speakers will address the marchers at town hall. Darling said she did not know who they will be.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are urging people to mask up, and stay home, for Thanksgiving 2020. Graphic: CDC

Darling was elected as Surrogate last year. She also is a lawyer, and emphasized the people she is representing as counsel are not political or partisan.

“They want to show the governor that the people can take care of themselves and are willing to do what is responsible. But they want the governor to respect their rights as well,” Darling said.

Meanwhile, with COVID infections rising every day, Murphy is imploring people to “do the right thing,” to avoid the catastrophic numbers seen last spring.

“We are pleading with people to not let their guard down,” the governor said this week. “There’s a lot of fatigue.”

“We are the densest state in the nation,” the governor said. “We’ve got not just people on top of each other, but communities on top of each other, and we can’t have a patchwork.”

Rather than shutting down the state, Murphy is trying to apply a second round of strategic restrictions, which he described on MSNBC as “shaving our parameters on the edges.”

Measures include a 10 p.m. curfew on restaurants and limiting indoor gatherings to 10 people. “We know when folks are congregating indoors, on top of each other, without face coverings, we know that’s leading to transmission,” he said.

Also, New Jersey and neighboring states are urging COVID tests for college students before they come home for the holidays.

Officials have defined responsible behavior as social distancing, hand-washing and mask wearing. Wearing a mask is problematic for some, however.

“These face masks are the most important, powerful public health tool we have,”
according to Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  

Addressing a Senate committee in September, Redfield  vowed to “continue to appeal for all Americans, all individuals in our country, to embrace these face coverings. “I’ve said if we did it for six, eight, 10, 12 weeks, we’d bring this pandemic under control.”

The CDC this week also urged people to stay home for Thanksgiving, to reduce risks of spreading the coronavirus and flu. Morristown mental health expert Donna Gaffney shares tips for safely navigating the pandemic holidays on The Morristown Green Podcast.

Darling wears a mask 99 percent of the time, but says: “If I don’t wear a mask and you do, your mask should work. If your mask works, then I don’t need one.”

According to the CDC, however, you could be infected without showing any symptoms, and be spreading it unawares. A mask helps keep people who are infected from spewing respiratory droplets to others when they cough, sneeze.

She doubts that lockdowns are worth the economic and social pain they incur. “We locked down last winter, and other nations locked down and guess what? They are having the same resurgence that we are having.”

The Lancet, a preeminent medical journal, says it is critical to act decisively and urgently.

“Effective measures that suppress and control transmission need to be implemented widely, and they must be supported by financial and social programmes that encourage community responses and address the inequities that have been amplified by the pandemic. Continuing restrictions will probably be required in the short term, to reduce transmission and fix ineffective pandemic response systems, in order to prevent future lockdowns.”

When New Jersey locked down, mortality rates dropped. Upon reopening, the state did many of the right things such as testing and emphasizing precautionary health measures at every turn.

Now, in COVID’s second wave, the state’s numbers are well below states that did little or nothing and only now are asking their people to wear a mask.

“It’s gotten worse, and it’s gonna get worse,” Murphy said of the pandemic on MSNBC. “So we’ve got to be honest with folks. Particularly with cold weather … with the holidays, this is going to get worse. Please God, it doesn’t get to the levels that we saw in the spring.”

 

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22 COMMENTS

  1. At least I know that it’s not safe on the streets of Morristown, as long as officials like Ms. Darling, ignore safeguards and promote a dangerous crowd gatherings.
    I prefer to follow the guidelines given by our Governor and protect my friends, neighbors and loved ones this year, so that we can all survive to celebrate another holiday in the future.

  2. Reckless! Will she assume liability for the people who get sick if this becomes a super spreader event? The ignorance is astounding.

  3. It’s especially reckless and irresponsible to have this demonstration the weekend before Thanksgiving.

    We already have data that indicates that Summer holiday celebrations were responsible for a huge upsurge in cases and deaths.

    If you don’t value the science, I guess you don’t follow the data?

    Happy Thanksgiving, Ms. Darling!

  4. Before protesting restrictions, talk to some ICU nurses & get their opinions.

    Protesting something which will save lives & flatten the curve to help our medical & emergency responders get through the next 4 months, is the most idiocic, selfish, and reckless thing anyone can do.

    Restrictions now prevent lock downs later.
    Stop being spoiled brats & deal with the restrictions. Everyone has too much to worry about without dealing with your tantrums.

  5. It’s amazing how many are still missing the key points:
    1. While correct that covid19 is not particularly lethal to young and healthy, especially with advances in treatment, it’s remarkably contagious and does land a lot of people in the hospital.
    2. Many people have health conditions that make them more susceptible than they think. This is human nature
    3. If our hospitals are full of covid patients and first responders are overwhelmed, who will come when you’re sick or injured with something else?

    There are promising developments in science such as vaccine and steroid and drug treatments, but they only work if there is not a huge wave.

    I agree that the right approach is a scalpel, not a sledgehammer. Keep k-8 schools open with measures in place. Keep limitations on capacity at high risk businesses, but seek legislative approval to continue them come every month or two.
    It’s going to be a hard winter. Stay home if you can. Wear a mask and respect other people.
    The virus is not magically going away. We have to work together to control this.

  6. The people who complain about lockdowns don’t give a crap about human lives, they’ve made that fact abundantly clear

  7. Y’all Are Idiots … I’m dying because of my illness and y’all want to protest to KEEPING ME ALIVE!! Y’all SUCK!!!

  8. ‘Darling wears a mask 99 percent of the time, but says: “If I don’t wear a mask and you do, your mask should work. If your mask works, then I don’t need one.”’

    That’s not how this works.

  9. The night time restrictions are due to drunken idiots doing drunken idiot things mostly. Question to Ms. Darling, is the function of a County Surrogate to willfully put lives at risk and overburden our hospitals? Because if so, you’re on the right track to achieve that. I’d respect all these silly anti-science libertarian shills more if they signed a pledge that they will NOT seek medical care if they come down with Covid-19. Go full biblical, why don’t ya???

  10. “She doubts that lockdowns are worth the economic and social pain they incur. ‘We locked down last winter, and other nations locked down and guess what? They are having the same resurgence that we are having.’”

    Ms. Darling’s “doubts” seem to be just her personal opinion. No facts nor data to support it. It’s not just about business; it’s also about the impact on our health care system. Even cases where people do recover put extra strain on that system.

    Here’s some background on what’s actually happening in other countries. Restrictions do work.

    https://www.connexionfrance.com/French-news/Covid-19-Four-signs-France-s-situation-is-improving?utm_source=Master+List&utm_campaign=c01f54528e-Vaccine_Coverage_Sat_Promo_NOV_21_2020&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9b5fbe85b4-c01f54528e-359143773

  11. I don’t understand people. I honestly don’t get it. Is it that big of a deal to wear a mask and follow some rules??? People are dying, it’s a really thing, hospitals are getting flooded, the earth is not flat. Do the right thing, it’s not that hard.

  12. Fern – have you ever heard the poem “First they came …” ? This is what people are afraid of. Not simply of wearing the mask. I, along with millions of others, have a big problem shutting down businesses people worked their entire lives for and support their families and others from, and destroying a large part of the economy because of a virus with many misrecorded deaths and misconceptions. Shutdowns don’t work. The vulnerable should stay home, and the rest of us should go about living, albeit a little more cautiously. If you are under 50 with no preexisting conditions, you are HIGHLY unlikely to die from this virus.

  13. In case she has not seen this, here’s some info for Heather:
    “Morristown: Positive Covid-19 Test Results
    As of November 20, 2020 Morristown has: 880 cases
    New Cases since last update (yesterday): 12”

  14. The fact that Heather thinks one mask is fine shows she has not studied the science. The mask wearer protects the other person. So if you wear a mask but the other doesn’t, you are susceptible to the virus from the un-masked person. It is unfathomable to me that this is still a debate. What is the big deal with wearing a mask?

  15. Patrick, you sound terrified. Mask-wearing compliance is at an all-time high, and the virus ain’t stopping. We’re now doubling down on what isn’t working.
    What is the the death rate from Covid, .45% or so? Most of the people who don’t make it had major health problems before they got the bug. Also, if someone dies WITH Covid their death is frequently listed as because caused BY Covid.
    They have you right where they want you.

  16. Those who come on here and complain about lockdowns, mask mandates, pandemic, fatigue, etc. Look in the mirror. The large percentage of our population that has not taken this seriously has allowed the virus to spread. Australia, China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea have all have been able to balance business and COVID control. We have lost over 250000 people, over 1000 people die every day. That’s equivalent to 4 to 6 airline crashes every day. Yet, you dismiss it. Europe made the same mistakes we had, but they are again trying to curb the spread while we argue about our right to not wear a mask? Do we allow people to drive drunk and hurt others? Can you fire bullets randomly in the air? People are wearing masks but without eye shields and N95s they cannot block all virus particles. So they need others to mask up and reduce the particles in the air. We all must do our part or lockdowns will worsen and thousands more will die.

  17. Nine months of lockdowns with no end in sight. Businesses forced under, arbitrary and widely-varying rules about what we can’t do, lies, half-truths, contradictions, isolation, and fear. This is no way to live. Despite most people taking precautions and higher than ever mask compliance this thing keeps getting bigger, and government keeps pushing its dirty hands farther into our lives. They are now talking about going into people’s houses and making arrests when there are too many people at the Thanksgiving table.

    We hear about two very effective vaccines, The reaction? More and tougher lockdowns.

    We need to start fighting back and to reclaim our country before they totally destroy it. Enough, already!

    https://youtu.be/mcm8Sc8f66o

  18. Heather,
    Your comment “We locked down last winter, and other nations locked down and guess what? They are having the same resurgence that we are having.”, is absolutely false. Most of Europe shutdown everything but schools during this surge and now their positivity rate is going down. How many more people have to die before you people take this seriously!

  19. Heather, if you are wearing a mask you won’t be able to pick your nose or your teeth. Your mask will protect you from ANY germs on your hands. Your health is your choice. Evidently you believe my health is your choice, too.

  20. I totally agree that this is pseudoscience. There is no science to support the virus becoming significant more contagious the moment the clock strikes 10PM and then going back to being just regular contagious at 5 am. I especially like the rules that casinos can stay open after 10 and are immune for the increased contagion *only* if they stop serving food and drink. I believe that Walmart has also been declared totally safe after 10PM as well.

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