Rising controversy could push Nevada to reveal it’s Covid-19 hotspots, possibly outing some casinos. On the heels of an expose by The Daily Beast, Governor Steve Sisolak suggested the state could reveal some of its internal coronavirus data.
In a piece that specifically takes aim at Las Vegas’ Cosmopolitan hotel, The Daily Beast interviewed several anonymous employees who claim they are “scared shitless” of the lack of safety precautions at the casino, and called it the Wuhan of the Strip. They describe stubborn and abusive customers, loosely enforced safety procedures and Covid-19 infected employees returning to work after as few as 3 days.
“I’m literally sick to my stomach every day I go into work,” one employee said. “So much anxiety about everything, and it’s so much worse on the weekends, when we’re packed well beyond the 50 percent capacity to which we’re supposed to be adhering,”
While other casinos are noted to be strictly following safety guidelines, industry analyst Jeff Hwang noted the Cosmo isn’t alone in its loose approach. “The problem with Cosmo is it drew crowds and [made] no attempt at enforcing social distancing,” he said. “I wouldn’t describe Cosmo as being particularly unique as far as those types of safety measures.”
Gov. Sisolak, who’s facing mounting pressure to divulge data on the role casinos are playing as super spreaders, said he might just give up the goods. “I think that’s an option that’s available,” Sisolak said during an August 24 press conference. “If we find a business that’s particularly egregious and has a high propensity of cases, that’s certainly something we could look at releasing.”
The problem is, as Sisolak tells it, that contact tracing could stain some businesses with a bad reputation they don’t deserve. “People might give you five, six, 10 or 20 places that they’ve visited where they might have contracted the disease, but they can’t specify the one place where they actually did,” he noted. “We have to be very careful to make sure businesses aren’t harmed by half-information being put out there.”
Even if contact tracing data of Covid-19 positive Nevadans becomes available to the public, it likely won’t give the whole story of just how bad the situation is. A recent GPS tracking study revealed that tourists visiting Las Vegas could be testing positive in their home states, hiding exactly how much the casino town is spreading the disease across the country.
