NATCHEZ, Miss. – The city a year ago today was thrust into an official state of emergency when then-mayor Darryl Grennell urged Natchez residents to forgo group activities as COVID-19’s global spread reached Mississippi.
“The only way we can reduce and slow the spread of this virus and flatten the curve of the infection rate, and the resulting impact on our health-care system, is by limiting our exposure to one another,” Grennell said in declaring an emergency March 15, 2020.
The Adams County Board of Supervisors followed a day later with a similar declaration that began a series of restrictions to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus. County Emergency Management Director Brad Bradford that day prophetically pointed to the widespread disruption the pandemic will have: “People say it’s going to be rough.”
A year later – after at least 79 Natchez-Adams County residents have died from COVID and more than 2,370 infected – the community remains in a state of emergency, but conditions are improving.
“It’s been a tough year, but I truly believe the worst is behind us,” said Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson, who took office in July.
He pointed to Natchez-Adams County’s declining number of COVID-related deaths and infections while mass vaccinations are being given to local residents as the country seeks to immunize millions of people from the virus.
After peaking at 123 new COVID cases and four deaths for the week ending Jan. 9, the numbers have declined in recent weeks, with 14 new cases and no deaths for the week ending March 6, according to the Mississippi Department of Health’s latest published tally.
More than 10,000 vaccine doses have been administered to Adams County residents getting the needed two doses of the Moderna/Pfizer vaccines or the one requisite shot for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, according the Department of Health.
“We’re on the right path,” Gibson said.
However, in the words of a USA Today Network reporter, the novel coronavirus “upended and ended more American lives than any event in generations.”
In addition to killing and sickening victims, COVID last year compelled state and local governments to order businesses to close, restrict public movement and limit inside and outside gatherings in an effort to curb the spread of the airborne virus.
Those rules have since been eased or lifted, but the most visible government mandate – the wearing of masks in public – remains in effect for Natchez-Adams County for now. The Adams County Board of Supervisors is meeting today and could decide whether to retain or rescind the mask order, which has been in effect for the county and city since July.
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves lifted the state-imposed mask mandate in early March, but local governments can continue to keep theirs in place.
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