Governor Abbott made the announcement Friday afternoon his plans to re-open the state of Texas. The re-opening will happen in phases with several key factors determining when businesses will open again.
Several executive orders were announced.
Executive Order #1 the creation of a Statewide strike-force to open Texas. The taskforce includes:
Lt. Gov Dan Patrick
Kendra Scott
Jim McIngvale
Ross Perot Jr.
Tilman Fertitta
Nancy Kinder
James Hofheinz
Executive order #2 focuses on the retail sector and re-opening as a to-go model. That means that businesses will have to deliver items to customers cars, homes, or places to minimize possible contact.
Also schools are to be closed for the rest of the school year.
Teachers can go to the classroom for video instruction or to clean out their classrooms. This also includes public and private universities.
Executive order # 3 focuses on healthcare. this order will loosen the restrictions on surgeries.
Beginning at 11:59pm on April 21 through 11:59pm on May 8, all licensed health care professionals and all licensed health care facilities must continue to postpone all surgeries and procedures that are not medically necessary to diagnose or correct a serious medical condition of, or to preserve the life of, a patient who without timely performance of the surgery or procedure would be at risk for serious adverse medical consequences or death as determined by a patient's physician. Exceptions now include:
Any procedure that, if performed in accordance with the commonly accepted standard of clinical practice, would not deplete the hospital capacity or the PPE needed to cope with COVID-19, or
Any surgery or procedure performed in a licensed health care facility that has certified in writing to Texas HHSC both (1) that it will reserve at least 25% of its hospital capacity for treatment of COVID-19 patients, accounting for the range of clinical severity of COVID-19 patients, and (2) that it will not request any PPE from any public source — whether federal, state, or local — for the duration of the COVID-19 disaster.