By Blake Haas
BLOOMINGTON – While Gov. Pritzker has called for a national mask mandate, one local lawmaker says he supports wearing facial coverings.
Speaking with WJBC’s Scott Miller, State Sen. Jason Barickman (R-Bloomington) said wearing a facial covering is key in fighting Coronavirus.
“Our family wears a mask. We support the notion that people should wear masks. I understand there is some kind of debate going on out there. Of all the proactive measures that we can take, we, as individuals, I think wearing a mask is one of the easier ones. Why not do it? Let the scientists and others continue to have their debate. We, the Barickman family, have been wearing our mask, and we plan to continue to do so and encourage other people to do so.”
Barickman said he also supports Illinois moving back in Phases if an uptick in hospitalizations occurs.
“The rational policy choices that we have to conscious of is the impact the Coronavirus can have on our healthcare systems. That is a very public concern that we should have. We should be cognizant of it, we should be tracking it, and we should be making decisions based on that. That is something that we watched. That is very different than what is in the news reports every day, is there are more cases. I expect for months, and possibly years, we may see reports of more cases. That’s because this virus is out there.
“But the critical test and the test that should lead to governmental action is whether those infected people, those sick people are actually landing in a hospital and are requiring the use of ventilators, which are severely limited around the state and country… Those are benchmarks that we need to be cognizant of and be prepared to react too.”
On Wednesday, the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) reported 1,187 new cases with eight additional deaths moving the statewide totals to 156,693 cases and 7,226 deaths.
Blake Haas can be reached [email protected].
