Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall said Tuesday she was discouraged by the number of people in her city ignoring guidelines to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
“It’s almost laughable,” said Mendenhall on MSNBC. “You see people really relaxing and putting their guard down, putting their masks down. It’s pretty obvious that the culture around safety with Covid-19 is laxing around Salt Lake City.”
“It’s very easy to look at the data and see testing is not increasing here, and the culture around safety is relaxing,” she continued.
Mendenhall noted that the number of coronavirus cases in Utah is rising, but you can’t blame it on increased testing as the number of tests conducting is not increasing.
She also defended the actions by her government and Gov. Herbert to shut down a number of businesses in the early stages of the coronavirus outbreak to help tamp down the spread of the virus.
“We feel legally sound about the decisions we’ve made,” she said. “Small business is 90 percent of the businesses in the State of Utah and Salt Lake City. So, it’s our bread and butter and it is absolutely one of our top priorities as we consider how to function with Covid, but the public health needs to be guiding the majority of these decisions right now.”
Watch the clip below via MSNBC.
