Some 572,562 people filed initial claims for unemployment in Massachusetts between mid-March and the second week of April, according to federal statistics.
The state's economy went from virtually full employment in mid-March to an unemployment crisis a week later, as the coronavirus emergency shutdowns began.
Governor Charlie Baker should act now to end the lockdown in many Massachusetts counties and towns — despite the public health officials and experts who predict a flood of deaths should businesses be allowed to reopen. Some of these are the same experts whose previous models were wildly inaccurate, predicting more than 2 million deaths from coronavirus in the United States and shortages of hospital beds and ventilators throughout the nation.
The number of confirmed cases of Covid19 in Massachusetts reached 38,077 as of Sunday, April 19. That's a lot of people. But this figure represents a little more than one-half of 1 percent of the population of the Commonwealth.
