With the lack of a nationwide plan to combat the rising number of COVID-19 cases, many municipalities across the U.S. are setting their own mask orders, self-quarantine orders or demands for bars to close, hoping that citizens will help to curve the spread of the virus. One Kentucky couple, however, is refusing to sign any orders saying they can’t go anywhere, even to the hospital, without health department approval. Now the whole family is being forced to face the consequences.
Kentucky station WILX reported that Elizabeth Linscott was planning to visit her parents in Michigan and decided to be tested for COVID-19. She tested positive.
“My grandparents wanted to see me, too,” Linscott said. “So, just to make sure if I tested negative, that they would be OK, that everything would be fine.”
When the positive test came back, she was asked by the health department to sign a form saying she would self-quarantine until she is well again to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. She refused to sign it.
“My part was if I have to go to the ER, if I have to go to the hospital, I’m not going to wait to get the approval to go,” she said. Though she promised that if she had to go to the hospital, she would take all of the precautions necessary.
Here’s a copy of the document:
Days later, she said the Hardin County Sheriff’s Department came to her family’s home.
“I open up the door, and there’s like eight different people, five different cars,” said Linscott’s husband, Isaiah. “I’m like, ‘What the heck’s going on? ‘This guy’s in a suit with a mask. It’s the health department guy, and he has three papers for us – for me, her and my daughter.”
The police placed ankle monitors on the couple, saying they can’t leave a 200-foot radius from their home.
“We didn’t rob a store. We didn’t steal something. We didn’t hit and run. We didn’t do anything wrong,” Elizabeth Linscott said.
The only reason that she didn’t agree to sign the document, she said, was because of the poor way it was worded and that if she needs a hospital while suffering from the virus, she intends to go.
“That’s exactly what the director of the Public Health Department told the judge, that I was refusing to self-quarantine because of this, and that’s not the case at all,” Linscott said. “I never said that.”
Read the full report here.
