Atlanta Mayor Blames Shootings On Bars Open Despite Coronavirus

ATLANTA, GA — Gov. Brian Kemp’s decision to keep Georgia’s bars and restaurants open during the coronavirus pandemic has had an unintended consequence, according to Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. Because people can’t patronize closed nightclubs in other states, she said, they come to Atlanta nightclubs — and shoot each other.

On Wednesday during an online news conference, Bottoms, a Democrat, pinned blame for Atlanta’s recent spate of nightclub shootings on Kemp, a Republican, who has allowed restaurants and bars to stay open during the pandemic.

The shooting death of Chicago rapper King Von is a good example, Bottoms said. Von, whose real name was Dayvon Bennett, was killed in a gunfight Nov. 6 in the parking lot of the Monaco Hookah Lounge on Trinity Avenue. Von had come to Atlanta for a release party of his latest album because Illinois closed its bars and restaurants in October.

“We’re open as if we are not in the midst of a pandemic,” Bottoms said, as reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “There’s not a lot that we can do about that locally, because obviously the governor has made the decision to keep the state open.”

The Atlanta newspaper reported Wednesday that Kemp’s office had not yet responded with a comment.

This isn’t the first time Bottoms has sparred with Kemp over pandemic restrictions. In July, Kemp’s office sued Atlanta over Bottoms’ mask mandate, calling it “unenforceable.” The two eventually were forced into mediation over the issue. Kemp later dropped his request for an injunction against the mask mandate. In August, Kemp dropped the lawsuit altogether.

GEORGIA CORONAVIRUS NUMBERS FOR NOV. 18, 2020

The Georgia Department of Public Health in Atlanta reported a total of 393,980 confirmed cases of COVID-19 at 2:50 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 18. According to the health department’s website, that includes 2,562 newly confirmed cases of COVID-19 over the last 24 hours. In addition, Georgia reported 734 new antigen-positive cases over the last 24 hours, which are considered to be probable cases of COVID-19.

Georgia has reported 8,536 deaths so far from COVID-19, with 42 more confirmed deaths recorded in the last 24 hours. Georgia also reported 529 probable deaths from COVID-19 since the pandemic. These probable deaths include fatalities with indirect evidence of COVID-19.

Georgia reported 33,667 hospitalizations — 228 more than the day before — and 6,306 admissions so far to intensive-care units. The percentage of ICU beds in use statewide rose about 1 percent to 81.4 percent of capacity, but not all of these beds are being used by COVID-19 patients. About 28 percent of total ventilators available in Georgia are currently in use.

No information is available from Georgia about how many patients have recovered.

Counties in or near metro Atlanta and other metropolitan areas continue to have the highest number of positives, with Fulton County still in the lead. Also, second-place Gwinnett County exceeded 34,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 for the first time Wednesday. The top four counties for new COVID-19 cases, all in metro Atlanta, experienced triple-digit increases in their case counts.

1. Fulton County: 34,839 cases — 208 new
2. Gwinnett County: 34,147 cases — 210 new
3. Cobb County: 24,558 cases — 225 new
4. DeKalb County: 24,162 cases — 215 new
5. Hall County: 11,677 cases — 74 new
6. Chatham County: 10,107 — 37 new
7. Clayton County: 9,240— 74 new
8. Richmond County: 8,895 — 29 new
9. Cherokee County: 8,371 — 71 new
10. Bibb County: 7,081 — 49 new

Counties in or near metro Atlanta also continue to have the most deaths from COVID-19. Also, Clayton County, on Atlanta’s south side, moved to ninth place ahead of Hall County, on Atlanta’s north side.

1. Fulton County: 653 deaths — 1 new
2. Cobb County: 487 deaths — 3 new
3. Gwinnett County: 476 deaths — 1 new
4. DeKalb County: 428 deaths — 3 new
5. Bibb County: 215 deaths — 1 new
6. Chatham County: 199 deaths
7. Dougherty County: 197 deaths
8. Richmond County: 192 deaths
9. Clayton County: 190 deaths — 2 new
10. Hall County: 189 deaths — 1 new

All Georgia statistics are available on the state's COVID-19 website.

Globally, almost 56 million people have tested positive for COVID-19, and more than 1.34 million people have died from it, Johns Hopkins University reported Wednesday.

In the United States, more than 11.4 million people have been infected and more than 249,000 people have died from COVID-19 as of Wednesday. The U.S. has only about 4 percent of the world's population but more confirmed cases and deaths than any other country.

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