COVID-19 05272020



GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Good afternoon, everybody, and thank you for being here today. I trust that everyone had a safe and wonderful Memorial Day weekend. A little different than most that we've experienced and what we've become accustomed to. But I do have to start today's press conference on a somber note, because I think as all of you are aware, this weekend Louisiana State Police trooper George baker passed away, succumbed to injuries that he sustained in the line of duty. In addition to being a state police officer, he also served I think at the police department in Greensburg for the St.?Helena Parish Sheriff's Office, he was also a United States Marine. So he served his country; he served his state; he served his parish and his community, and he did so well. In a final act of service to others, Trooper Baker donated his organs so that others may receive the gift of life. So I would ask everyone to join me and Donna in praying for his wife Heather, their daughter Harper, and Trooper Baker's entire family. I have ordered the flags to fly at half staff in his honor tomorrow, which is also the day of his Memorial service in Hammond. For today's reporting, we are reporting 443 new COVID19?cases around the state. That brings the total tested positive thus far to date to 38,497. So those 443?cases are 6,621 new tests, bringing us to a total of 347,647 tests. I would like to point out that over the weekend, the rankings of the states changed on per capita cases. We are now number nine, so we moved down another slot. You may recall that a couple of months ago, we were number two in the country in per capita cases. I also point out, because we didn't have our press conference on Memorial Day, the recovered is now estimated at 28,700. So that leaves us about 10,000 active COVID19?cases based on tests. That number has been remarkably steady for at least the last month or so, and we should always remember, there are a number of individuals out there who have COVID19 who have not been tested. So there are well over 10,000?cases. We don't know that precise number, but the CDC estimates that somewhere between 25 and 35?percent of people with COVID are totally asymptomatic or so mildly symptomatic that they're likely not to be tested and show up in those test numbers. So as we increase our test numbers and our cases, one of the things that we look at is the percentage of positivity among the tests that we administer. And the World Health Organization and the CDC have a goal of 10?percent. If you're below 10?percent, you're doing relatively well. If you're above 10?percent, you've got a ways to go. I think if you look at the total number of tests administered and the total number of cases, it's about 11?percent. But you've got to remember that weeks ago, we were testing people who were in the hospitals almost exclusively, so our test positivity rate at one point was in the 40s, I think. So it's coming down. And then if you look more recently at a daily number on positivity, they've all been below 10?percent. Today was 6.7%. Yesterday was 2.4 percent on more than 10,000 tests. So we're doing relatively well on that metric as well. And of course the comprehensive testing that we're doing in the month of May, I think, has a lot to do with that positivity rating. I would point out that we are on track. We told you that our testing goal for May was 200,000. As of today and this month, we have tested 179,369. So that leaves about 20,631 tests that we need to administer over the last several days of May in order to get to that 200,000 level. That's a little over 5,100 tests per day. We believe that we will make it. We know that we're resourced, and we're out with all of our partners and doing the mobile testing across the state. So we think we're going to get to that 200,000 tests, which is 4.3 percent of the state's population. So that's a critical number. And that's more than twice the minimum amount that's recommended by the federal government. They recommend no less than 2?percent, and we believe we'll be at 4.3 percent in the month of May. We're ramping up testing all across the state and those areas that have been inadequately tested up to now where we might see hot spots but also in congregate settings, both with respect to residents and staff. And in those settings, and in those settings only, the CDC recommends for sentinel surveillance, I think is what they're calling it, that you actually test symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals. Unfortunately today, we are reporting new deaths; 21 of them, which brings the total number of deaths to 2,617. We do have some more good news on the number of COVID patients that are hospitalized across the state of Louisiana. That number today is 798. This is the first time in two full months that we've dipped below 800. So even as the cases increase, we see the hospitalizations decreasing. 100 of those 798 patients are on mechanical ventilators. I want to talk a little bit today about something that you've heard about not so much in Louisiana but around the country, and I think most of the early stories came out of New York City. But according to the Centers For Disease Control, MISC, which is the acronym for multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children, is something that is real and it's happening around the country, and it's happening here in Louisiana. Obviously, like its name would indicate, it's a condition in children where different body parts can become inflamed, including the heart, the lungs, the kidneys, brain, skin, eyes, gastrointestinal organs. And we don't yet know exactly what causes it, but we know there is a relationship to the virus with these children, that they've had it or that they've been in contact with someone who actually had COVID19 disease. And it can be serious, and it can be deadly. But most children who are diagnosed with this condition do get better with appropriate medical care. And the definition of an MISC case, the individual has to be under the age of 21 with a fever, evidence of inflammation, and severe illness involving more than two organs that requires hospitalization and no other plausible diagnosis. And then a positive COVID19 test or exposure to a confirmed case within the four weeks prior to the onset of symptoms. So when we talk about this particular syndrome, that's what we're talking about. I do want you to know it's in Louisiana, and that's why the department of health has shared two of what they call health alerts to all healthcare providers across the state, first on May the 9th, and then again on May the 15th. These alerts raise awareness of MISC and urge providers who have cared for or are caring for currently patients younger than 21?years of age and meeting these criteria to immediately report them to the Office of Public Health infectious disease epidemiology team. We can tell you that we have 13 confirmed cases of MISC across the state of Louisiana and 1 MISC related death. To respect the privacy of the young person and that person's family, obviously, we're not going to share any additional details at this time. Of the 13 confirmed cases, the range in age is from zero to 19. The median age is 11. Six of the patients are female; 7 are male. Four are hospitalized; 8 have been discharged. In terms of race, 7 are black; 3 are white; and 3 fit in the "other" category. In terms of ethnicity, 2 are Hispanic and 11 are nonHispanic. For context, we know that we have had 880?cases tested of COVID19 in individuals who are 18?years old and younger. The department of health will report this data weekly on Mondays in its coronavirus webpage. And if we have more updates that need to be brought to your attention, I will relay them here as well at our press conferences. The website that you can get this information is LDH.. Finally, you may have seen that the Department of Revenue under secretary Kimberley Robertson is waiving penalties for March and April sales tax returns. So they'll waive penalties for sales tax filers who submit their March?2020 and April?2020 returns and remit the sales tax and any interest owed by June the 30th. If a taxpayer cannot remit the sales tax and interest by June?30th, they may still be eligible to have the penalty relief if they can enter into an installment payment agreement by June the 30th. So at this time I've got a couple of questions from the public that we will entertain, and then we will take questions from those of you here. Andrea in Lake Charles: Is there any need for people with no symptoms to get tested, and if we're negative, do we need to get retested at any point? Well, as I mentioned earlier, we're still following the CDC guidance, which is not for the general public to be testing if they are asymptomatic. There is an asymptomatic test that's part of our surveillance program in congregate settings, so in places like these labor camps or jails, prisons, nursing homes. And that goes for patients and staff. But for other individuals who are asymptomatic, we are not presently encouraging them to get tested. I will tell you that anyone who receives a negative test, that means that they are negative on that day. It does not mean that they won't become positive at some point in the future. And theoretically, it can happen the very next day. And so that one test is important, but it doesn't mean that you won't get it in the future. And so if you test negative but then subsequently develop symptomatic? I'm sorry, symptoms that are consistent with COVID19, you need to be tested again. Rosa in Shreveport wants to know if it's safe to eat in restaurants. Well, the way that we've arranged for restaurants to operate, both inside at 25?percent with social distancing and outside with social distancing, it is safe. Obviously, you're safer at home. And the message for any individual who is vulnerable to this disease by virtue of their age or underlying comorbid health condition? again, those are hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, kidney disease, obesity, those things? then they are obviously much safer at home. However, if you go to a restaurant and you eat and individuals who are serving you and the employees have their masks on and you wear your mask to and from your table and you're sitting with individuals who are from your immediate household, you can do that safely. And so we just want to make sure that you feel safe when you go there. And, again, wearing that mask protects others from yourself, and when they wear masks, they protect you from themselves. And what we've learned from the Centers For Disease Control is they now believe that the vast majority of cases are contracted not because people are touching surfaces where the virus is but through airborne particles that contain it virus. And so it's being spread when people are talking, like I'm talking right now, or if you cough or sneeze or that sort of thing. And that's why that face covering is so important. So I want to thank Andrea and Rosa for their questions, and I'll thank you in advance for your questions? well, before we do that, did you want to say anything about those two questions? Okay. So, with that, we'll take your questions now as well. Greg?AUDIENCE MEMBER: Governor, either in the middle or during the end of the 14day period where they're analyzing the data and the trajectory? GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Are you about to do what you always do?AUDIENCE MEMBER: Of course. GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Okay. I'm going to do what I always do?AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Well, you know, there's so many different things that you look at. And so I'm not going to tell you that we're meeting the criteria. I'm going to tell you that we are tracking reasonably well when you look at the overall numbers for the state. I just mentioned to you that the percentage of positive cases is well in hand, that the number of hospitalizations is at the lowest its been in two months, and so forth. But sometimes if you have populous regions of the state, such as New Orleans and Jefferson Parish, and they had such a high case level at one time that if they decrease substantially and all you're looking at is the state numbers, you don't really know what's happening by region and parish and so forth, including hospitalizations. So we're going to look at all of that. I am encouraged, but I am not making any announcement today. That announcement will be made next week as to what the decision is. The current Phase II order is in effect through June the 5th, which is a week from Friday. And so as I mentioned to you, early next week? I hope to do it on the first, but, you know, the first is also the last day of the regular session. But we also know it's the first day of the special session, so I think we can probably keep that timeline, because I don't think it's going to be a real climactic day in terms of a lot of legislation pending and trying to get through conference committee reports and that sort of thing. So hopefully we're going to be able to keep that day for making the announcement, which means we're going to be doing the analysis? well, they're doing the analysis now. I will be receiving that analysis and the recommendation from the department of health over the weekend. And you will know when I make the announcement, Greg, but I appreciate your persistence on that. Yes, sir?AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Well, you know, that's a great question because we know as you bring more people into contact with one another, there's a lag time of no less than 7?days, but 10?days, 14?days, before you're going to see the cases really pick up. We haven't seen that yet. We do happen that there was a lot more activity this past weekend, Memorial Day weekend, than there have been at any time since this public health emergency started. Obviously that causes us some concern as to what we might see in a couple of weeks. You know, I'm praying that people were, for the most part because I've seen pictures and know not everybody, was responsible and took care to make sure that they were abiding by the social distancing, the masks, the hygiene practices and so forth. But really we don't know. All I can tell you is up to now, we haven't seen anything that indicate that we are? we? a surge in cases. That could come with tomorrow's data. And if it does, we'll let you know. But otherwise, you know, we don't see it. But it is critically important that people understand there's an awful a lot of COVID19 out there. It's as contagious today as it was two months ago. It's as deadly today as it was two months ago. And so we're asking people to do what we've been talking about all along. And that's how we keep cases down, in addition to the expanded testing and the contact tracing around those test results. That's going to be really critical for us going forward. Yes, ma'am?AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: First of all, I'm a huge tiger fan. It would be devastating to me. And I'm optimistic. I choose when I think about this fall to think of it aspirationally. And sometimes I let my hopes get in the way of what objective reasoning would indicate is the most plausible outcome, but, you know, I want to think that we're going to have thing under control. And potentially through the testing, the contact tracing, the development of more therapeutic treatments, and all sorts of things, that we'll have the ability to resume many of those activities. I doubt that they will look exactly like they looked last year, except for the scoreboard. I want the scoreboard to look exactly the same in every game. But in terms of the number of fans who go to the games and so forth, right now, I just? it's hard for me to see that, but, you know, I hope that that can happen. But, you know, I share Coach Orgeron's feelings on that. It would not be good if we couldn't do that. And by the way I really think it's critically important that we get our young people back on these college campuses, too. And we know the key to doing that is you've got to be safe; you've got to be responsible; you've got to be deliberate. And I can tell you, our higher education leaders are working nonstop to develop best practices. They're doing that talking to the department of health. They're doing that talking to counterparts across the country. So that's going to be critically important too. And by the way I understand the two go hand in hand. Because the NCAA is led by Mark Emmerich who used to be at LSU. And he's announced that if students aren't on campus, those universities are not going to be playing football. And I don't think he said football. I think he said sports. So it all goes hand in hand. And of course the educational side of the institution, as much as I love football and baseball and everything else, the educational side of the institution is obviously the reason LSU exists. And not just LSU. This is true for all of the higher educational institutes in the state of Louisiana. So we need to get our young people on campus this fall, and that will include my baby, who just graduated from high school, and he'll be at LSU in the fall. Leo?AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Fund, I haven't. Now, look, funding could be cut just because revenue is down, and that's a big problem. That's part of the CARES Act funding that we have, the $1.8?billion. And you may recall the congressional delegation sent me a letter, encouraging me to abide by the intent of the legislation which is that 45?percent of the share coming to the state, 45?percent of the 1.8 billion, almost $900?million, would be reserved for local government. And so that would be available for these fire districts as well. The issue is you can only use this to cover expenditures related directly or indirectly to COVID19 and not to replace lost revenue. But there's a lot of expenditures. And for first responders, which would certainly fit here, the secretary of the treasury put out guidance that provides for a tremendous amount of flexibility. So we do hope that that's something that can be brought to bear for local government, including the EMS and the fire departments that you've just mentioned. And so we're working on that presently, trying to work through some issues with the legislature, but we do believe that that 45?percent should be reserved for local government. Yes, sir?AUDIENCE MEMBER: Governor, Jay Darden's said a few times that he doesn't think locals will be able to tap into all that $811?million. The legislature obviously wants to do something different. They want to take 200 million and give it to small businesses. Given that it doesn't look like locals are going to be able to spend it all, why not give the $200?million to small businesses, or do you have another vision (inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Well, first of all, I'll get back to what I just mentioned. When the CARES Act was passed, for states that had municipalities that I think was 500,000 in population, they received an allocation of CARES Act funding directly to the municipality. And I think the way they were doing that is 45?percent of all of the funding that would go to that state would go to local government. So I received a letter from, I think, the entire congressional delegation asking that we honor that in the state of Louisiana even though the act itself doesn't absolutely require it. So I agreed then that we should reserve that funding for local government. It may or may not be possible for, between now and the end of the year, because that's the time frame they have to do it, for local government to submit expenditures directly or indirectly related to COVID19 with the attestations and so forth in order to drawdown that full 45?percent. But we also know that our own senator, senator Kennedy, is promoting a bill in the senate that would retroactively create even more flexibility for the funding that has already been made available so that it can replace lost revenue. If he is successful? and we have already gone through all of the CARES Act funding, then none of it will be left for local government in order to replace revenue. So that's something else that I think we have to consider. Obviously we want to be as helpful as we can to businesses, especially small businesses, across the state of Louisiana. We do know that Congress is likely to pass more legislation? I guess you would call it phase 4? at some point by the end of June I think is what we were told today on the national governors association called. It looks like that's the national timeline we're going to. That bill could contain the flexibility on the 1.8 billion that I just mentioned, or it could contain additional dollars for state and local governments which could be used to replace the revenue. But in any case, I believe that we're going to be coming back? and I've shared this with the President and the speaker? at some point in the first part of the next fiscal year to get an update on the forecast, what is the economic activity in the state like in terms of generating revenue. So what does that revenue forecast look like. Update that, but also take into consideration whatever Congress does between now and then. And then we can adjust the budget, and we can also do some other things as well. So I'm talking about a potential special session in that time period. I think that's when we ought to consider what funding source we might have available. You know, for example, one of the things that the small business might prefer, let's say that same $200?million is available, rather than assistance to small business, we put it in the unemployment/insurance trust fund, because that would lessen any likelihood or the amount of a tax increase in order to replenish that trust fund. So there's all sorts of things that we can consider. I just don't think now is the right time to do that. And I want to abide by the spirit of the CARES Act legislation as expressed by the congressional delegation. Yes, sir?AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Yeah, say it ain't so?AUDIENCE MEMBER: Yeah. What is your concern there, and what do you say to those people, especially when they look at the numbers (inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Yeah. Well, we know that that's not true. I mean, so for example, we can tell you just based on individuals who have tested positive, we have at least 10,000?cases of COVID19 in the state of Louisiana today. We happen that we've got a lot more than that because, again, approximately 25?percent of the people who are going to get this disease are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic. They don't know they have it. They're not going to get tested, but they are nevertheless contagious. That's one of the things that makes it very, very difficult. So the mask is a huge part of making sure that we don't have a spike in cases again, like we saw a couple of months ago. So I really am asking people to heed the CDC guidance on this, the department of health guidance on this, and of course we're doing more than ask. If you are a businessowner or an employee of a business and you're coming into contact with customers, we're requiring that mask. We're strongly encouraging it for everybody else. When you leave your house and you're going to be within 6 feet of someone who is not in your immediate household, you need to have the mask on. And it's just the right thing to do. And I will tell you that I think Dr.?Fauci said it best earlier today. Those who don't are asking for trouble. Those who don't are asking for trouble. And it's not something that many people are consciously asking for, but we're just, for whatever reason, some folks are not complying with that. And we need compliance, because we all have a goal to get back to as much normalcy as possible, to open up as many businesses and have them operating at full capacity and so forth. And we hope to do this over time. But as we do that, we have to do it safely. Because if you have cases spiking, then we know that people aren't going to be going out to eat. They're not going to be going to the store. They're not going to be resuming their lives as normal and so forth. So I just encourage people to do it. And, look, we've had a tremendous amount of cooperation. There's only one way to go from number two in the country in per capita cases to number nine and to go from having the fastest growing number of cases in the country, and perhaps in the world, to where we are today, and that's because the people have, for the most part, done the things that we've been asking. But over time, it's human nature to kind of start to think, well, we're past this. Well, we're not past it. And I hate when people say, well, will it come back in the fall? Well, it hadn't left. You know, this is the motherinlaw who stays. I shouldn't have said that. I love my motherinlaw. But the point is, it never left. And so we shouldn't talk about whether it it's going to come back. I mean, it's still here. And as long as it's going to be here and we don't have a vaccine, there was a new normal. And that new normal includes things like a mask. Yes, sir?AUDIENCE MEMBER: Obviously close to 200,000 tests administered in May, as you mentioned (inaudible) is there any reason to think, since the state has done a good job to this point, it's most likely going to reach that mark? (Inaudible). GOVERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Yeah. I think it will depend? first of all, the 200,000 number is a number that we gave to the federal government. We gave that number to Admiral Gerard at the health and human services at the public health service and to all of the officials there as our testing plan. And it's not just a number. It is where you conduct those tests, how much of it is mobile, how much of it is responding to hot spots, how much is going into congregate settings and so forth. And so we can certainly increase it if they would resource it and we feel a need to do that. You know, as far as what we intend to do, I believe our goal, at least for May and June, is the 200,000. But I'm going to? he's had a long weekend to rest, and y'all haven't asked any questions of Dr.?Billeaux. He did appear before the senate government economy today, and we hope he will be confirmed by the senate. I'm sure he will be because he's been doing an excellent job. But I'm going to ask him to come up and kind of walkthrough that? what we think the future of testing is going to be. I can tell you the federal government's talking about an at thing effort all the way through the month of December. And not to say that there won't be testing beyond that, but they are talking about resourcing state testing plans through the month of December. Come on up, Alex.DR. ALEX BILLEAUX: Thank you. It's a difficult question to answer definitively. We knew that first we needed to surge testing to make sure that we knew where COVID was in the state. We had done a good job, again, hitting that in April, the 2?percent goal that the federal government had laid out for the states to reach of the per capita tested. But when we looked across the state, it was not evenly distributed. We still had parishes? three that were below 2?percent? and we're working really hard to get testing into those three parishes and bring them so that we can say every parish has had at least 2?percent tested. But then we knew above that, since we were already at 2?percent and hadn't reached everybody, we were going to have to double our efforts, literally, to reach those populations where we weren't seeing enough testing. We know that the African American population bears a disproportionate burden of cases and deaths related to COVID19. So we wanted to make sure that just as we watched percent positivity across the state, we watched percent positivity within that population. If we're seeing a high percent positivity, we don't have enough tests in those communities, reaching people early enough, to be able to actually control what's going with COVID. At the same time, we've also learned a lot about the risks in congregate settings. We've learned that there's asymptomatic spreading. Unlike in the general public, asymptomatic spread seems to have a real large effect within congregate settings because of that close proximity. All the things that we're trying to get the public to do to keep themselves safe? keeping distant, you know, not spending a lot of time around people who are not in your household? are really tough to do in those settings. So we had to surge testing in those areas. And in the near term, that's been working really well with the National Guard, who's done an outstanding job of bringing resources to communities around the state. And I'm just grateful for the women and men of the National Guard for that work. But we don't want a system in Louisiana that relies on the National Guard being activated through December?2020 to help with us. So while we've been surging into those populations, we've been doing congregate at thing, the other thing we've been doing is doubling down on our longstanding partnerships with community clinics, with hospitals, with federally qualified health centers that serve those communities but early in the epidemic were not resourced with the amount of specimen collection kits that they needed. And so we are trying to give them those kits so that they can do the specimen collection, setting up hub and spoke models where, as they collect specimens, we're not asking them to process them inhouse or buy expensive equipment; instead, creating partnerships and contracts with labs in centralized locations that we can bring those to so that we can get that processed quickly. All of that infrastructure, to the Governor's point is, what we want to have through December?2020. All of that is what's going to put us in a good position. So your initial question is are we going to need to do 200,000 tests going forward? It's not clear. Because if COVID numbers continue to go down, if there's less COVID in the state, if people do, you know, act as good neighbors, wash their hands, stay home if they're sick, wear masks, if our businesses do what we're asking them to do, protect their employees by wearing masks, protect their employees by asking the public to wear masks when they come in, if all of that happens, we should see cases continue to go down. And then arbitrarily testing 200,000 people doesn't make sense. But what we want to have, if we need it, is the capacity to do 200,000 or more. And we continue to build that capacity. And what we've achieved and will achieve in this month will show us that we have that capacity and it's not something that's fly by night. It's capacity that we're building to maintain through the coming months because we need to be prepared for whatever comes.AUDIENCE MEMBER: Question for you. On the congregate settings, do you have an update on how many crawfish farms have now had clusters of coronavirus? You said last week there was 100?cases. Do you have updated numbers of how many workers at these facilities have tested positive?DR. ALEX BILLEAUX: I do not?AUDIENCE MEMBER: And will you ever have an update on that? You obviously give these numbers for nursing home facility. I guess I'm just wondering why we haven't gotten an update on this.DR. ALEX BILLEAUX: So I think we talked about this last Friday. I think a situation in which we are giving every cluster in the state, I think would be challenging frankly for the Office of Public Health to manage. And really where we're drawing lines then becomes a little bit arbitrary. In the context of nursing homes, there's a federal regulation that requires that the nursing homes report. We are reporting the data that the federal government? or some of the data that the federal government is asking. We're actually doing that down to facility level, which we understand may not even be the level that the federal government reports. We talk about other high risk congregate settings on our dashboard as adult residential facilities, give those numbers in aggregate. But for businesses, we do not foresee a future where, you know, providing those data on an ongoing basis on a website or otherwise. And, again, to emphasize, the reason for that? because I want to be clear. I had the opportunity to say this in the senate governmental affairs committee, and I'll repeat it here for the general public. The Office of Public Health takes transparency very seriously, and it's something that we have been really striving to achieve since the beginning of this outbreak, under the guidance as well of the Governor, who made it clear from day one, look, we may not know everything, but we need to be clear about what we don't know. Let's be transparent about that, and as we do know things, share that as well. So that's our watch word. However, that has to be balanced with public health. Our main mandate is to protect and promote the health of all Louisianians and communities across the state. And one of the ways to do that is to ensure that anybody that has a COVID? symptoms of COVID or any organization or cluster that may have symptoms of COVID feel comfortable and, in fact, feel encouraged to come forward to the Louisiana Department of Health, to the Office of Public Health, and alert us to that fact. Because we cannot serve those communities, those individuals, those settings, without them feeling that they can freely come to us. So that's why Louisiana and many states give that protection and do not disclose the privileged health information relegated to those outbreaks if they do not present a risk to the public. Rest assured, if any of those do present a risk to the public, you'll know about it?AUDIENCE MEMBER: What's privileged about the aggregate number? I'm not asking for a name.DR. ALEX BILLEAUX: Oh, there's? the aggregate number for all workplaces is essentially, you know, in our overall Case Number. What we don't have is the ability to say here's business related cases; here's nonbusiness related cases. And I think where your question might lead us is starting to make arbitrary decisions about which businesses do we want to report on or not, and I don't think that that makes sense from a public health standpoint. There are certain communities that we do think, certainly because of federal regulations and state regulations and the particular risk that those groups present, like nursing homes, rise to that level. But, again, you wouldn't want a situation in which every business, especially now as we move into reengaging sectors of the economy, feels that they would have any incentive to hide cases from us. Because first and foremost, my job for the state, for all of you, is getting control over COVID; is identifying those cases, working with the organizations, where the people who have COVID are, whether they're employees or residents; and serving them and you by trying to get control over the outbreak and making the rest of Louisiana as safe as possible?AUDIENCE MEMBER: I have another one for you. How many nursing homes and other facilities is the state? because I understand the state has a role in helping places that can't? don't have the capacity to test everyone. How many places has the state gone into and helped them test all of their residents and staff?DR. ALEX BILLEAUX: Yeah, so I don't have that number off the top of my head. I'll say that there's sort of three different groups, which is one of the reasons I wouldn't have that number. One is most nursing homes across the state have told us, you know, we're interested in testing, but like those federally qualified health centers or others I was talking about earlier, we just don't have the kits. And so one of the things that our regional medical directors are doing is making sure that they have the supplies needed to collect specimens. Nursing homes have medical directors, have medical teams able to do that work if they were so supplied. So a large group are doing that testing without needing much more support from us, apart from the kits, which we were fortunate enough to get from the federal government, as well as relationships we're building with labs that have their own kits around the state. Another group are facilities that are asking for help because there's maybe more than their medical teams feel they can control, or they're just looking for the best practices in testing and so we have that ability to go in and help with testing, especially if there's constraints on staff time. And I don't have that number of how many we've directly tested versus supplied. The third group, though, is work that we've been doing from the beginning virtually in infection control assessment and response, and that's the comprehensive CDC developed protocol, essentially, of going through an understanding. What are the procedures in place? Who might need testing? What are the PPE levels that you have on hand? What are the protocols that you have for training staff? Have you reduced? or rather ended congregate dining? All those kind of issues that we want to make sure every nursing home knows, especially as they have cases or as they have suspected cases, we've been doing that virtually from the beginning. We have now in this month stood up what we call strike teams that are doing that work as well. And so we have a number of facilities that we've gone in physically to do that work. Prioritizing those where there's a request from them for health and certainly where we're hearing about concerns, maybe through our epidata or through others in their community. I don't have that number either, but those three groups are our focus. Thank ERNOR JON BEL EDWARDS: Thank you. Also, we will be back at this location Friday at 2:30?p.m. for our next press conference. Thank you again for covering this, and thanks again to the people of Louisiana. We have made tremendous progress over the last couple of months, and it's a result of their compliance and their patience. And I would just urge you to continue to do that. We do remain in Phase I, and, you know, we were looking forward to going to Phase II as we were able and when we are able. And we hope to have an announcement on that? well, I guess we will have an announcement? we just don't know what the announcement will be? early next week. So thank you. We'll see you back here on Friday. ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download