Like him or loathe him, Cuomo is right: wishing coronavirus was gone doesn't make it true

We cannot afford to make a mistake of this magnitude

Cuomo warned New Yorkers about compliance over the weekend (Getty Images)

Where I live, on eastern Long Island, summer begins on Memorial Day weekend and lasts until Labor Day. We’re a place that has a lot of wealthy second-homeowners, but we’re also where city people come to escape and party. In March, many escaped New York City’s infection rates by waiting it out here, where there’s more space, lovely beaches, and a little more luxury.

But as time passed, and the weather got nicer, locals and visitors alike got tired of the rules of quarantine. Lately, it has felt like lockdown doesn’t exist at all. Walk out on the streets in the middle of the day and you’re bound to see half the population without masks. Beaches are packed, rules are not fully being enforced, and the governor, Andrew Cuomo, recently called our area out as one of concern.

Citing 25,000 reopening violations between Manhattan and the Hamptons, Cuomo announced that he was willing to reverse opening procedures in the areas where people were failing to comply. “I'm going to reverse it in those areas where those local governments did not comply with the law,” he said during a press conference on Sunday. “That is what is going to happen here. I am warning today, in a nice way, consequences of your actions.”

Choosing to reopen — especially here, in the most infected state — was likely a mistake, and we’ll see the full consequences of a lack of compliance down the road. But we are open now, meaning the onus is upon us. It is on us to decide whether a haircut is worth it, whether a trip to a bar is worth it, whether dining out frequently is worth it, whether failing to wear a mask in public is worth it. Things are not back to normal, and believing that they are is a tragedy waiting to unfold.

Part of the problem is that the federal government did not do enough to address the real crises faced by small businesses, particularly in the restaurant industry, and now restaurants are clamoring to open — and are possibly breaking some rules in the process — because not opening means ceding their survival to the virus. It’s not really their fault. The president could have intervened on their behalf, and, in fact, numerous people called on him to distribute federal aid to the industry. Celebrity chef Tom Colicchio called on Trump and Congress to bail out independently owned restaurants at one point — but they ultimately did nothing to help save a crippled segment of US business, despite the fact that this industry employs over 14 million Americans.

Opening restaurants is one thing. Failing to acknowledge, as a population, that the threat of a virus is still here, despite the warm weather, protests, and general distraction is entirely another. The predictions have not changed. We are likely still in the middle of the first wave of this pandemic, with a second wave waiting on the horizon. Opening the doors to life-as-usual, simply because waiting for life to begin again became painful and inconvenient, will cost us dearly in the end.

New York has struggled mightily since the pandemic began. Only recently were city residents able to part with the refrigerated trucks that housed human bodies, when morgues ran out of space for the dead. That’s the real cost of returning to normal life. That’s the consequence that Cuomo is describing to all of us, when he warns us to stay vigilant.

If we have to continue living inside for a long, miserable summer, then so be it. Compliance is not a punishment. It’s a patriotic duty. Because this virus is not behind us — it’s not even close to behind us. And failing to take seriously this reality simply because it is inconvenient — and, yes, unpleasant — will only turn the hands of time backwards. We cannot afford a mistake of such magnitude.