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For days, he and his crew had been converting dorm rooms into shelters for those experiencing homelessness while the predicted peak of coronavirus pandemic looms. “I felt like I needed to do my part to help, and this was my chance.”
The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) under the CARES Act could be a crucial lifeline for many Massachusetts small businesses including retailers, bars, sandwich shops, and restaurants. Unfortunately, these businesses may face an unintended conundrum.
There is a lot of advice circulating about how to try to stay physically well, but little talk about psychological angst that the threat of an extremely contagious, potentially fatal disease creates.
“Our volunteers are heroes. They have been incredibly responsive during this crisis. They’ve also been patient, kind, and working as a team with (at-first) perfect strangers, who all share the same goal: to do good.”
Tap rooms have been shut down, while businesses have had to adapt to a lack of foot traffic and extended stays. Many have embraced curbside pick-up and delivery, but that’s only produced a fraction of what many local operations need to continue.
This article is a sequel to our extremely popular COVID-19 Crash Course for Small Biz Payroll Protection Plan Applicants
According to one probationer who I spoke with for this column, that routine—which they had to go through twice last week—involves waiting in a lobby close to other people, riding in an elevator with an Averhealth employee, pulling their pants down and shirt up, peeing in a cup, and handing over the goods.
“Even folks who hadn’t experienced anxiety will likely be experiencing it, and folks who have it, it’s likely to get compounded considerably.”
The virus can live for up to 24 hours on cardboard, VAG, which mean it’s the package, not the panties, that are potentially a danger here.
The scores of temporary closings are likely hiding an ugly truth—that many of the places that are shuttered aren’t just closed for the time being.
![For days, he and his crew had been converting dorm rooms into shelters for those experiencing homelessness while the predicted peak of coronavirus pandemic looms. “I felt like I needed to do my part to help, and this was my chance.” READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT DIGBOSTON[dot]COM! #labor #homeless #news #Boston #Massachusetts #coronavirus #COVID19](https://digboston.com/wp-content/plugins/instagram-feed/img/placeholder.png)
