Cameron County Judge Eddie Treviño Jr. did not hide his irritation at a Tuesday afternoon press conference with the many county residents who still aren’t taking mandatory shelter-in-place, social-distancing and travel restriction orders seriously, noting that several people had been arrested over the weekend for noncompliance.
“Is somebody going to actually have to lose their life in Cameron County so that all of you who don’t want to abide by the shelter-in-place rule will actually stay at home? Or does it have to be one of your family members to get sick? … We’re trying to get ahead of this. There is no cure,” he said.
Treviño said all options are on the table, including checkpoints if necessary, to get all residents to comply.
“Even though we’ve made it mandatory, people still can’t seem to understand how serious this is,” he said. “Taking your entire family to H-E-B to buy groceries? You don’t need to do that. Taking your children, your parents? It’s not necessary. Please, if you do your part, we’ll get ahead of this. If you don’t, this is going to linger and this order’s going to remain in place as long as necessary.”
On March 25 there were only 7 confirmed cases countywide, nearly quadrupling in five days. Six new cases were reported in the county on Monday, including five from the Harlingen area and one from Brownsville, Treviño said. Of the 26 total cases so far, 11 are from Brownsville, seven from Harlingen, three from Rancho Viejo, two from Los Fresnos, and one each from Laguna Vista, Rio Hondo and San Benito, he said.
Eight of the cases have been cleared and six are hospitalized: one at Valley Baptist Medical Center Brownsville, one at Valley Regional Medical Center, two at VBMC Harlingen and two at Harlingen Medical Center, he said. In the county, 441 people had been tested as of Tuesday afternoon, including 217 at city of Brownsville’s drive-through testing site at the Sports Park.
