Most adults in the United States wouldn’t return to their normal lives even if the government lifted all coronavirus social distancing orders.
All but five states have issued some form of a shelter-in-place order mandating that residents stay home unless they are completing essential errands. While the states have given their social distancing recommendations some legal teeth, most U.S. citizens are not interested in returning to normal life no matter what orders are put in place.
According to a Gallup poll released Wednesday, 14% of adults in the U.S. would return to normal life if government restrictions were lifted “right now.” Forty-two percent of adults reported that they would return to normal life if the number of coronavirus cases “declined significantly,” while 38% said they would wait until there were no new cases reported for several days. Seven percent said they would wait until a vaccine is developed.
Republicans were more likely than Democrats to say they would be willing to go back to normal life immediately, with 22% saying they would return to socializing, while 5% of Democrats gave the same answer.
Respondents noted they are hesitant to return to normal life even if they do not believe they would have “severe symptoms” from the COVID-19 virus. Among those who believed it was likely they would get severely ill from the coronavirus, 8% said they would return to normal life if government restrictions were lifted today. Of those who feel getting seriously sick is “unlikely,” 15% said they would return to normal activities immediately.
While social distancing measures can offer some protection against catching the virus, most adults still don’t want to venture out. Seventy-one percent of those who claimed that they feel “very confident” in their ability to protect themselves from the virus in public said they would still not return to normal life if the orders were lifted immediately. Among them, a plurality would not return to normal life until the number of coronavirus cases drops “significantly.”
The poll was conducted from March 27-29 and included responses from 2,908 adults living in the U.S. The margin of error for the poll was 4 percentage points. As of Thursday morning, more than 216,000 U.S. citizens had confirmed cases of the coronavirus, and more than 5,100 had died from it.
