Florida county's medical examiner begged officials to close beaches, internal emails reveal

Beaches in Florida’s St. Johns County remained open to record crowds through most of March, despite mounting concerns raised by the county’s medical examiner and residents.

While many states were issuing directives to residents to stay home in March, officials in St. Johns County, home of St. Augustine, kept beaches open, even as the county’s medical examiner repeatedly said the county couldn’t handle a deadly outbreak, according to emails obtained by Columbia University’s Brown Institute for Media Innovation and reviewed by The Washington Post. The county later closed the beaches on March 29 and then partially reopened them two weeks later. As of Saturday, there have been four deaths from covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, and more than 200 confirmed cases in the county, a sliver of the 35,463 cases and 1,364 deaths in Florida, which are concentrated in more populated areas such as Miami and Fort Lauderdale.

As domestic travel slowed amid coronavirus concerns, South Florida beach communities faced ire after thousands of spring breakers partied by the ocean instead of socially distancing. When a community further up Florida’s eastern coast reopened in the midst of mounting death rates, #FloridaMorons trended on Twitter.

On Monday, St. Johns plans to reopen its beaches completely, amid a national debate and protests about access to beaches in coastal states. In California last weekend, thousands gathered at beaches, prompting Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) to close those in Orange County. Georgia and Alabama officials, eager to restart their states’ economies, reopened or eased restrictions at beaches on April 30. In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has repeatedly said it’s up to local officials to open or close beaches. St. Johns is among several Florida counties granting beach access this week.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/florida-countys-medical-examiner-begged-officials-to-close-beaches-internal-emails-reveal/ar-BB13xDCK?li=BBnb7Kz