With the Covid-19 coronavirus still spreading, seemingly into every nook and cranny of the United States, Americans in some places are deeply concerned about the threat posed by nearby neighbors across state lines.
It’s been observed from the start of the pandemic that the virus does not respect borders drawn on maps.
And for those living in states with significant pandemic restrictions — mask-wearing, limited gatherings, etc. — near states with less stringent rules, that’s worrisome. The lack of help or even much guidance from the Trump administration adds to their concern, reports the Washington Post.
No one knows it better than residents of, say, Bristol TN and Bristol VA, which share a downtown area; the state line is marked by a series of plaques running down the middle of — what else? — State Street.
That narrow line conceals a wide difference in the states’ approaches to the pandemic.
“[O]n the Virginia side, gatherings greater than 250 people are banned, and Gov. Ralph Northam (D) is again urging people to stay home,” the Post says. “On the [Tennessee] side, NASCAR recently hosted one of the first major sporting events of the pandemic, with 20,000 spectators and the governor in attendance.”
The Post also focuses on rural Malheur County OR, on the Snake River, where virus infections started rising rapidly last month, “turning the remote region bright red on maps of hot spots.”
The county health director, Sarah Poe, knows multiple factors are at work, including heedless Malheur residents who have stopped wearing masks despite an Oregon mandate to do so.
“But she also saw a threat directly across the Snake River: Idaho,” the Post says.
The Malheur public health department has traced Covid-19 cases to the many residents of Boise ID, less than 50 miles away, who cross the state line for work (including at an Oregon state prison), shopping and legal marijuana sales.
“The parking lots are full, Idaho license plates are throughout the entire facility, and there’s lines going around the buildings” at marijuana dispensaries, Oregon state Sen. Lynn Findley (R) told the Post.
There are many similar situations, including in Helena-West Helena AR, on the western bank of the Mississippi River.
The huge river is “a natural barrier to infection — except that a bridge connects the city to Mississippi, and Louisiana is close by. Both states have been virus hotbeds, and across the river from the Arkansas city are three counties labeled as red zones,” the Post says.
Helena Mayor Kevin Smith calls the bridge a “funnel” for the coronavirus among the three states.
“We have three state policies, and the president did not want a national strategy; he basically said, ‘You’re on your own’ to the states and the cities. So we have a patchwork of things,” Smith told the Post. “All of us have been left to fend for ourselves.”
In New Mexico, the Democratic governor has managed to more or less keep the lid on the pandemic with strict mask and social-distancing mandates. But Las Cruces, in the southern part of the state, is just 45 miles from El Paso in Texas, a Republican-run state where rules are much looser or optional.
Texas is a Covid hotspot and New Mexico health officials are tracing more and more cases to the El Paso area and to the cross-border “oil patch” region of West Texas and southeastern New Mexico.
