The Job Creators Network, a group representing small businesses, sponsored a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal on Thursday calling for pandemic restrictions to be eased.
Formatted as a letter to top government infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci, the letter concludes that the group fears his “limited view is causing too much unneeded pain.”
The ad, a “six-figure investment,” according to Alfredo Ortiz, president and CEO of JCN, is the first in a multimillion-dollar campaign aimed at reassuring the public that the economy can safely reopen.
“We’re concerned about the country and fear that extending the shutdown will destroy the economy and have unanticipated negative health consequences for millions. We also want to reassure Americans that as states start to reopen, there are ways people can safely and smartly come out of their homes,” Ortiz said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
The ad, calling for a “second opinion” besides Fauci’s, features Dr. Scott Atlas, the former chief of neuroradiology at Stanford University, who is quoted saying, “With sensible precautions and sanitization standards, most workplaces and businesses should reopen.”
It also notes that under an economic shutdown, elective and preventative procedures don’t always occur, which can have serious and sometimes life-threatening consequences for patients.
In addition, the ad stresses that economic crises can take a toll on mental health.
To open the economy, the ad calls for “strategic testing, tracing, and smart business innovations” to “isolate the few to protect the many instead of isolating the many to protect the few.”
The JCN is a nonpartisan organization that began in January 2014 and was founded by entrepreneurs like Home Depot Inc. co-founder Bernard Marcus.
