I saw an Italian curator friend for lunch on Friday. He told me that most Italian museums outside Lombardy, hit hard by COVID-19, opened in the beginning of June after a shutdown of about ten weeks. No one rushed to reopen to minimize losses in revenue from tourists. The Chinese coronavirus had already killed tourism for the year. Rather, they opened when the Italian government said it was safe and they were ready.

Museum staff used the shutdown to implement the reasonable health protocols needed to welcome people back: frequent hand-sanitizer stations, masks, glass barriers for ticket-takers, and temperature checks. There’s nothing more that they, or any museum anywhere, can do. Museums are public places, not hospitals.