Today, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced a new round of Coronavirus restriction rollbacks for nearly the entire state, which will start Monday. Executive Order GA-30 allows Texas businesses that are currently open at 50 percent capacity to open to 75 percent capacity. This includes most businesses like manufacturers, restaurants, retail stores, gyms and office-based employers.
According to Abbott, there were only three regions in the state that are excluded from this 75 percent capacity measure. They are the Rio Grande Valley, Laredo, and Victoria, where COVID-19 related hospitalizations are considered too high.
These counties, in-particular, fall under the governor’s second new mandate, Executive Order GA-31, which targets hospitals throughout the state in areas of high COVID-19 hospitalization rates. In short, this order requires those hospitals to maintain at least 10 percent of their occupancy strictly for COVID-19 patients. It also states that hospitals with high numbers of COVID-19 hospitalizations shall postpone all surgeries and procedures that are not medically necessary, to maintain the capacity to treat COVID-19 patients.
Other restrictions, including the wearing of masks and other facial coverings, are still in full effect.
For more information on the new orders, please visit https://open.texas.gov/, and scroll to the “Open Texas Checklist.” The actual executive orders can be viewed at Executive Order GA-30 and at Executive Order GA-31.
