Not Even New Coronavirus Shut Down Can Stop Shootings In Chicago

CHICAGO — Not even the new coronavirus can stop the shootings in Chicago.

On Friday, around the time Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced a statewide stay-at-home order and Mayor Lori Lightfoot urged Chicagoans to “love each other with all our hearts” during the fight to slow the spread of COVID-19, police reported a 25-year-old man got shot in the neck near 115th and Perry Avenue in Roseland.

Seven more people were shot and wounded, one fatally, before the stay-at-home order went into effect. On Saturday, the first full day of the stay-at-home order, four people were shot and wounded. That was one more non-fatal shooting than the same day last year.

By Monday night, 13 people were shot and wounded. One man was shot and killed, police said.

It's evidence that Chicago’s shooting epidemic co-exists with the new coronavirus pandemic. It's a problem that's putting added strain on hospital emergency rooms. And it's not confined to our city's borders amid this national emergency.

On Wednesday, Baltimore Mayor Jack Young begged for a shooting truce after seven people were shot and wounded in his city. He issued a warning and plea, “We’re dealing with the COVID virus, and those of you who want to continue to shoot and kill people in this city, we’re going to come after you and we are going to get you.”

“We cannot clog our hospitals and their beds with people that are being shot senselessly because we’re going to need those beds for people infected with the coronavirus,” the New York Daily News reported Young saying.

It’s an issue in Chicago, too. Dr. Andrew Dennis, a trauma surgeon at Stroger Hospital, says what people might not realize is that as hospital emergency rooms are treating an increasing number of coronavirus patients, they’re still seeing a steady number of trauma victims.

The trauma unit was busy this weekend at Stroger Hospital, where alongside COVID-19 patients doctors tended to drunken driving crashes, battery victims and a late-night shooting victim who died from his wounds. Each patient was separated only by curtains, not independent, isolated rooms.

“These are struggles at every institution. We’re still getting our regular 10-15 trauma victims coming to the trauma unit on a regular basis. … People will always not follow the rules and you’re always going to have violence,” he said. “We’re trying to mitigate risk, preserve our protective equipment as best as possible while providing patient care and keeping the same high standards for treating trauma while protecting patients and ourselves. It’s hard to do.”

On Monday, Chicago police reported that the number of both shooting incidents and wounded victims between March 16 and Sunday decreased compared to the same period in 2019. There were six fewer shootings and nine fewer wounded victims during the same seven days in 2019, police said.

It's hard to find comfort in those statistics while you're stuck in your house knowing that even if scientists brew up a coronavirus cure, we still live in a city infected by shooters who won't put the guns down.

Mark Konkol, recipient of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting and Emmy-nominated producer, was a producer, writer and narrator for the "Chicagoland" docu-series on CNN. He was a consulting producer on the Showtime documentary, "16 Shots."

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