“Some of you have joked that I am like the mom who will turn the car around when you are acting up,” Lightfoot said during a Wednesday news conference. “No friends, it’s actually worse. I won’t just turn the car around. I am going to shut it off. I am going to kick you out, and I am going to make you walk home.”

In Florida, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez said “everything is on the table,” but is waiting to see if recently implemented measures curb infections. He has closed indoor dining, movie theaters and casinos and added a 10 p.m. curfew. City of Miami Mayor Francis Suarez -- whose jurisdiction accounts for about 470,000 residents in the county of about 2.7 million -- said Thursday he wanted to prepare business leaders for a possible return to a lockdown like the one in March and April that closed nonessential businesses.

“In the next few weeks, if something is not done to dramatically alter our course, we could be in a more dire situation,” Suarez said.

Florida’s emergency operations center -- a key hub for its Covid-19 response -- temporarily closed Thursday after several employees tested positive, the latest sign of just how hard it has been to contain the virus.

Texas Reset
In Texas, where the virus threatens to overwhelm hospitals and morgues, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner told CNN that his city needs a collective effort, “maybe a two week stay-home, work-safe order reset to cool things off and then gradually move forward again.”

And one of Governor Greg Abbott’s top medical advisers this week told the Houston Chronicle that the outbreak is getting bad enough to warrant lockdowns in some locations.

“It’s clear that the state has not been on a sustainable course, and it’s worth considering a regional approach,” said Mark McClellan, a physician, economist and former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. “It’s so hard to stay ahead of the pandemic when it’s in a growth phase.”

Read more: Texas Readies Morgue Trucks in Preparation for Virus Surge

Abbott previously had blocked local governments from taking aggressive action to stem the pandemic, but on Thursday he pleaded with residents to wear face masks. “These is no need for a lockdown if everyone will adopt this best practice,” he said.

Elsewhere, fights continue over the last round of restrictions.