To put this in an aviation perspective, the way I see this as being handled is as if after the first events of 9/11 happened, only the airspace in the northeast was shut down. Then as other planes crashed, airspace in that area got shut down. And then each individual airspace made its own rules about what flying was allowed, and when operations go back to normal. Imagine what people (and pilots’) reactions would have been if that was the case; I’m pretty sure it’d be much like what we’re seeing now. And the longer this mixed and inconsistent messaging continues, the harder it will be to get things under control, and the less likely people are going to do the right thing. Which is exactly what we’re seeing with the inconsistent stay-at-home orders: people ignoring the orders. And that’s why people are talking about lifting them because they “aren’t doing any good”. That’s true, but only because people are ignoring them.
So where does that leave flight training? Not in a very good position, is my view, because there’s no clear guidance about what should be done. Not that it matters in my local area, because most pilots have stopped flying, even by themselves, so there’s no one to instruct to begin with.
I just hope that we don’t find a lot of flight schools out of business at the end of this, because it took so much longer to resolve than it should have.