Ocean Isle Beach Follows Sunset Beach With Beach Closures

Today, Ocean Isle Beach followed Sunset Beach with amending their State of Emergency order effectively closing the beach.  Here is the official excerpt:

Beginning at 12:00 noon on April 7, 2020 extending through 12:00 noon April 21, 2020, the beach strand and all beach accesses are closed to the general public, residents and property owners (INCLUDING OCEANFRONT PROPERTY OWNERS), with the exception of governmental officials, town staff, beach patrol staff and turtle patrol volunteers with proper credentials. 

Brunswick County remains at 26 cases and noted today that all tests are not reported therefore the test numbers might be underreported.  This is a mess!  Here is the official excerpt:

Note: Brunswick County Health is encouraging providers in the County’s jurisdiction to continue to report persons under investigation (PUI) at this time, however NCDHHS no longer mandates that the PUI form be completed and sent to the local health departments, which could result in under reporting of test counts. These numbers reflected the information reported to the County from local health care providers.

There are some encouraging signs that social distancing is working and the models are now predicting “better than expected” outcomes.  Still, the deaths are mounting and the case numbers are climbing across the nation despite an obvious lack of testing in our state.  frankly, it does not look like that will change unless there is a massive outbreak or some major shift in the nation.  My concern with this is that the longer we live in denial, the longer this will tread on…

I believe the two closures by Sunset Beach and Ocean Isle are in anticipation of Easter Weekend and the traffic that the holiday would bring to our area.  Now, there is little reason for anyone to visit and those who had made plans can stay home.  Despite closing short term rentals and public parking, people were still ignoring orders and finding ways to circumvent.  By closing access to everyone, hopefully it adds one more step in mitigation and encouraging the shelter-in-place stay-at-home order from the State of North Carolina.  People have shown their entitlement in the Facebook Groups and remain combative and overly dramatic, but as the adage goes: “better safe than sorry”.