NYC Gazette

In January, as the spread of the novel coronavirus began to pose a threat to the country, New York City Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot encouraged city residents to go about life as usual. 

Barbot encouraged New Yorkers to practice everyday precautions as they would through flu season.

“The risk to New Yorkers for coronavirus is low, and our preparedness as a city is very high,” Barbot said on Feb. 2. “There is no reason not to take the subway, not to take the bus, not to go to your favorite restaurant, and certainly not to miss the parade next Sunday.”

Barbot was not the only New York official who originally encouraged residents to go on with their daily lives, before learning how easily the coronavirus spreads.

In February  Mayor Bill de Blasio encouraged New Yorkers to go out--if they were not at high risk.

“If you’re under 50 and you’re healthy, which is most New Yorkers, there’s very little threat here,” de Blasio said. “This disease, even if you were to get it, basically acts like a common old or flu, and transmission is not that easy.”

He even encouraged New Yorkers to go to a movie in early March, days after President Trump issued a travel advisory for areas of Italy and South Korea, Iran, and barred entry of any foreign citizens who had visited Iran.

However, on March 14, de Blasio urged the government to consider nationalization of factories to create medical supplies to prepare for what was to come.

The Daily Caller quotes de Blasio as saying, “This is a case for nationalization if crucial factories and industries that could produce the medical supplies to prepare this country for what we need. People are going crazy trying to get hand sanitizer.”