Chris Christie says US economy should reopen as ‘there are going to be deaths no matter what’

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Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie has said that the US needs to restart the economy, despite estimations predicting this action will mean thousands more will die from Covid-19.

During an appearance on The Daily DC podcast, Mr Christie said that people are going to die from coronavirus whatever action is taken, and added that there needs to be a balance between helping the economy and saving lives.

After host Dana Bash asked the former governor his thoughts on predictions that suggest 3,000 will be dying daily in the US by June, he said that people are going to have to accept some deaths.

“Of course, everybody wants to save every life they can ― but the question is, towards what end, ultimately?” he said.

“Are there ways that we can thread the middle here to allow that there are going to be deaths, and there are going to be deaths no matter what?”

The former governor also referenced WWII, and compared reopening the economy amid the coronavirus pandemic, to the sacrifices made by soldiers during the war.

“We sacrificed those lives. We sent our young men during WWII over to Europe, out to the Pacific, knowing, knowing that many of them would not come home alive,” Mr Christie said.

“And we decided to make that sacrifice because what we were standing up for was the American way of life. In the very same way now, we have to stand up for the American way of life.”

Twitter users were critical of Mr Christie’s claims, and political writer Matt Friedman referenced his approval rating when he was New Jersey governor, to show his idea has little public support.

“Christie’s lowest approval rating (14%) was still a bit higher than the percentage of NJ residents who think the stay-at-home order goes too far (11%),” he tweeted.

Additionally, user @cmcret was critical of the former governor’s remarks about sacrifice during WWII.

“It’s always amazing how those who have never sacrificed are the first to suggest everyone else should sacrifice. Comparing this virus to WWII shows the abject ignorance of these idiots. People who weren’t on the front lines didn’t die because of WWII,” they wrote.

Mr Christie appeared on the podcast the same week that two separate forecasters predicted that deaths related to coronavirus will increase in the US in the coming months.

An internal Trump administration model, has predicted that deaths from coronavirus in the US will increase to 3,000 a day from 1 June, according to a report obtained by the New York Times.

Separately, a model created by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, is now predicting that 134,000 people will die from coronavirus in the US, a figure that is close to double its previous prediction.

Ali Mokdad, a professor of Health Metrics Sciences at IHME, told CNN that the increase in predicted deaths is due to social distancing measures being relaxed in states including Texas and Georgia.

He said that one of the reasons for the increase in predicted deaths “is increased mobility before the relaxation, premature relaxation, of social distancing,” and said that “we’re seeing an increase in mobility that’s leading to an increase in mortality, unfortunately, in the United States.”

According to a tracking project hosted by Johns Hopkins University, there are now upwards of one million people who have tested positive for coronavirus in the US. The death toll has reached at least 68,406.