Public health experts and local elected officials raised concerns Tuesday over whether Georgia businesses are ready to reopen safely while the coronavirus pandemic continues to chalk up new infections and deaths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But business leaders welcomed Gov. Brian Kemp\u2019s announcement Monday that some businesses will be allowed to reopen<\/a> as soon as the end of this week as a first step toward getting critically needed cash back into their coffers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kemp said Monday a host of businesses including gyms, fitness centers, bowling alleys, tattoo parlors, barbershops and hairdressers will be allowed to reopen this Friday. Dine-in restaurants and movie theaters can throw open their doors next Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the number of Georgians who have died from COVID-19 was up to 799 as of noon Tuesday and positive cases had risen to 19,881, Kemp said the number of new cases is flattening and emergency room visits are declining. He also announced a plan to increase both testing for the virus and the contact tracing that follows patients who test positive for coronavirus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOur citizens are ready for this,\u201d the governor said Monday. \u201cPeople know what social distancing is.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe have the hospital bed capacity and the ramped-up testing and contact tracing,\u201d he said. \u201cI believe we will be able to stay on top of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Georgia mayors criticize Kemp<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mayors across Georgia criticized reopening businesses as premature and potentially dangerous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Atlanta<\/a> Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said during an interview broadcast by CNN that any progress Georgia has made against the spread of coronavirus stems from the statewide shelter-in-place order Kemp imposed through the end of this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf we\u2019re in a better position, it\u2019s because we\u2019ve been aggressive in asking people to stay home,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m perplexed that we have opened up in this way. I don\u2019t see that it\u2019s based on anything that\u2019s logical.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Athens<\/a> Mayor Kelly Girtz, who issued a shelter-in-place order two weeks before the statewide order went into effect early this month, said it\u2019s too soon to reopen businesses while there\u2019s still a lack of adequate testing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s like sending a football player onto the football field saying, \u2018Eventually, we\u2019re going to give you some pads and a helmet. Eventually,\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Barbershops, beauty parlors and nail salons are exactly the type of settings where it\u2019s impossible to maintain social distancing, said Albany<\/a> Mayor Bo Dorough, also in an interview with CNN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dorough worried Albany<\/a>, one of the hardest-hit outbreak areas in the country, could see a reversal of gains made recently toward curbing hospital admissions and viral transmissions due to social distancing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI understand the governor had a difficult decision to make,\u201d Dorough said. \u201cI do, however, think he made the wrong decision.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Health experts fear another outbreak<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Several public health experts also cast doubt Tuesday on whether the state is ready to reopen social gathering spots like restaurants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n