Dear Ms Candidate: COVID Response

Dear Ms Candidate, 

Inquiring minds would like to know how you would have handled COVID?

Mahalo for your well thought question.  

My first line of defense would have been to shut down all incoming traffic and quarantine tourists, which would have been a priority the second that Covid left Wuhan.  The tourism industry would have been then redirected toward the sanitation of their workplace during this phase of development.  The use of gloves and masks would have been mandatory for both healthcare and tourism industries, as the two most exposed areas.

On the second day, stores like Costco and Walmart would have been closed down with all non-essential businesses, for a period of a week.  Upon return, they would be required to spend a week sanitizing their workplace.  Quarantine would have initially lasted a week for the sanitation process, using only the base minimum businesses to conduct daily business.  During this time, all workplaces would have been required to sanitize their business.  Gloves and masks would have been a requirement during this phase and with these workers.  The staggering of movement would give time for germs to die while personal safety supplies had a chance to replenish between waves of necessity.  This would have also avoided a lot of panic.

If Hawaiʻi would have protected its people and prevented incoming infection,  there would have been a lot less of a chance that it would have come here and we would not have gone through such negative economical impact.

Also to note that if I were already in office, many more of our agriculture and local products would be on the shelves of our businesses, because the thought of depending solely upon external resources for internal sustenance undermines Hawaiʻiʻs economic stability in general.  Furthermore, the misappropriation of CARES Act funding only deepened the already harsh circumstances.

In terms of dealing with financially-affected residents, all assistance programs would have paid three months rent because it is cheaper to think ahead, than it is to deal with it afterward.  Some great examples of this statement are: 

     - burial plans:  If you pay for your burial plan while you are still alive,  it is thousands of dollars cheaper than if your family gets stuck with the bill after you die.

Online job fairs would offer positions of redirection to residents who were brave enough and wished to continue working during this time.  The positions would have offset the number of unemployment claims while offering low-risk positions such as environmental maintenance.  

Thank you for the opportunity to use my voice on behalf of the people.