Secretary stacy hurst who will talk shortly about our parks our state parks and our outside recreation activities and i was previously joined pie director a. J. Gary who had to leave because well see got a few other things going, including responding to the tornado in jonesboro. So hes got two crises on his hands and i appreciate his work as well. Yesterday as we reported, we had 426 covid19 cases in arkansas. Today, we have 473 cases which is an addition of 47. We have 62 who are hospitalize asked one new county which is arkansas county. In addition, we have an additional death thats added to the total so we have now seven deaths, as a result of covid19. And again, dr. Smith will provide more details. Im going to turn it over to him for his comments and then secretary hurst and i will follow that with two announcements today. Thank you governor. I want to give a little bit more detail on our numbers. We did have a jump up of 47 to a total of 473. The breakdown between male and female remains about 60 female and our racial distribution is about the same 74 white, and 15 africanamerican. We have 17 children, aged 18 or less, 149 older adults, 65 years and older and 307 aged 18 to 64. We have as reported yesterday, six pregnant women. We have 37 who have diabetes, that is plus one, heart disease, 36. Thats plus four. Chronic lung disease, thats plus one. We still have 10 with Chronic Kidney Disease and were plus one to 12 on those with immunocompromising conditions. We have 71 that we know were related to domestic travel, thats up two. 73, who are healthcare workers, thats up six from yesterday. As the governor mentioned, we have 62 hospitalized, thats up 19 from yesterday. Thats a substantial jump. Yesterday, we had had a slight decrease of five. We have 47 in Nursing Homes thats up four and we now have an additional nursing home that is that has a case. So we are up to a total of five Nursing Homes. We have 21 who are on ventilators, thats up five from yesterday. The governor mentioned we will have one additional death. This is an individual over the age of 65 and this was our first nursing homerelated death. We have 29 who have recovered. Thats up 29. We have one new county, arkansas county. A couple of things i want to mention briefly. The question has come up to me about sports activities, outside sports. Outside sports activities are just fine as long as you can maintain at least a sixfoot distance. And again, if its a tennis match, for example, thats fine. Just before and after dont start coming so close together that you then spread the virus between you at that point. So sports, other Outdoor Activities are great as long as theres a healthy at least sixfoot distance between individuals. State parks, secretary stacy hurst is going to talk more about that. Great place to do something during this time. Outside is great. Theres plenty of opportunities to be spread apart, good ventilation, uv radiation from the sun which inactivates viruses, but again, be mindful dont stand so close together when youre waiting to go on the trail or whatever. Out of state travelers. We have states around us that have some hot spots in them and we have to be findmal and especially at our state parks those are enjoyed by people from our state. Just be mindful that the people around, you need to do social distancing so that youre not at risk of covid19 from an out of state traveler. Theres a question thats come up about this prohibition on social gatherings of more than 10. And i think thats a good rule. Its a directive. And it is designed to protect the people of arkansas from transmission of covid19. But we need to be thoughtful and mindful of how we apply it. 10 or else is not all the same. If theyre 10 of your family members who youre around all the time some none of them are sick. Thats one thing. If youre Standing Shoulder to shoulder with 10 people from 10 different states who you dont know,thets a different thing altogether. It only takes one person to transmit covid19 to the other nine. So even when youre in smaller groups and outside, still keep that healthy distance. At least six feet to prevent transmission. With that, ill turn it back over to the governor. I kept listening for the word basketball, but i didnt hear it in his comments. Thats very Practical Health advice that you give. I asked secretary hurst to be here to obour state parks and weve had some concern about congregating in our state parks people wanting to utilize the outdoors, ask her to point up the actions that have been taken. Thank you, governor hutchison and secretary smith. Parks are currently open. But we have taken pretty extensive measures to reduce the risk for our visitors and our staff. A couple of examples, all of this is listed on our state parks website, but a couple of examples for you today, we have closed lodges. We have limited camping to r. V. s selfcontained r. V. Units only. Weve closed bathhouses and Visitor Centers at state parks are largely closed. Museums and exhibits are closed. Weve also moved to a contactless checkin system for camping and so that will reduce the contact between visitors and our staff. We want to continue to provide this valuable resource to the public, but we need everyone to take very seriously the responsibility they have to help flatten the curve and reduce the spread of the virus. The number one thing people need to do is practice social distancing. Even youre outside, you need to avoid congregating in groups. And we hope that will not continue to happen. Our state parks team of rangers interpreters and the superintendents will be driving around and monitoring such congregating. So they will remind you of your responsibility to practice social distancing. Thank you. Thank you, stacy and, and now, let me take two announcements. Let me give you a little background first. Previously the state allocated 30 million to acquire protective equipment for those on the front line. Nurses and first responders. That 30 million has allowed us to move forward on the supply chain, to lock in some of the supply delivery dates so that we should be receiving those fairly shortly as well as what weve received from the national stockpile, but based upon the demand and the need thats out there and protocol projecting the future that 30 Million Investment in protective equipment is not going to be sufficient to last us through this crisis and thats very clear. So based upon what the legislature did in creating the covid19 rainy day fund, i am announcing the approval of 45 million in additional funds to go towards purchase of the personal protective equipment. In addition, the purchase of ventilators as they become available in the marketplace. We have to allocate those funds in advance in order to be able to get in the supply chain and were looking not just what we need tomorrow and 30 days, but were having to look at what we need 60 days down the road. And i want to thank the General Assembly, particularly speaker shepherd and Senate Pro Tem for setting up this fund and for their Quick Response in approving this emergency measure. And so thats 45 million in additional funds to go to those the protective equipment that is so much needed by those on the front line. Secondly, let me give you a little bit of a background on the challenge here. I was on a call with the president earlier today as well as other governors and the vice president. Clearly, their focus is on the hot spots from new york city to california to new orleans. And so as theyre having to devote an enormous amount of resources to those venues, it makes it even more challenging for states like arkansas to get in that supply chain. Where hewe can place an order and the department of defense might come in and say well, we need that. Or it might be new york offering a premium and so were having to compete on a very difficult marketplace. I spoke with one supplier today and said his demand is 60 more than his capacity to produce and thats a sellers market. They dictate the price. They dictate the terms to a certain extent. So were having to work in that environment and were doing it by the state being engaged in larger purchases so that we can compete with the others that are around the country and internationally looking at at the acquisition of the same thing were trying to acquire. The second announcement i wanted to take today, that under the cares act, the federal legislation that congress passed, the states will receive federal funds to help meet the needs of this crisis and this is a very significant amount of money that will be coming into arkansas. You can see the significant need because ive just recited 75 million just in shortterm acquisition of protective equipment. And so were going to have a significant amount of federal funds coming in between now and the end of the year, actually come in sooner than that, but it will have to be allocated between now and the end of the year. So today, i didnt have ive signed an executive order setting up a Steering Committee made up of my administration and six members of the General Assembly in order to guide and shape and make recommendations on the use of the federal money as they come in. This will be a Steering Committee that will work between now and december 30th. Their duties will expire because that funding at that point will expire, as well. The members of the General Assembly were appointed based upon recommendations of the speaker and the Senate Pro Tem and i look forward to that Steering Group helping to guide as we allocate funding in the future for the emergent needs that we have. With that i would be happy to take any questions. The calendar year . Calendar year. So the funds actually should be available from the feds within the next 30 days. But it has to be spent between march 1 and december 30th calendar year. [inaudible question] we anticipate 1. 25 billion in federal funds. Could this money be used to fill budget holes . No, it states that it will be used for costs related to the covid19 crisis and were looking for further interpretations, but i do not anticipate that that can be used for filling the holes in the budget even though the postponement of the tax deadline and the filing deadline is the result of the covid19 crisis. So were still looking for some clear guidance on that, but i do not anticipate that. What types of things that might be spent on . Well, its going to be used for the acquisition of hospital beds that might be needed. The ventilators respirators. The equipment that ive identified and the length of the acquisitions is undetermined because we could have this summer, this spring issue with covid19 and we dont know whats going to happen next year with it. So part of it going to be the Current Crisis in meeting the needs and costs, but it also could be looking at in the future and how we deal with as this might be what with us next year and what we need to do in preparation for that. [inaudible question] doing anything for emt workers . For like ambulances and those kind of guys. Yes. Ill let dr. Smith articulate where they are on the priorities, but were very mindful of that and we know that they need this equipment as well but do you want to address that more quickly . Absolutely. Emts the whole Emergency Medical Services are part of our priority system. Obviously, weve not had as much ppe as we want, we need but they are definitely a priority there and since we licensed them were in close communication with them, we can give specifics. I dont have those numbers with me. I can get specifics, though. Are you going to do the same thing with nurses and doctors in terms of with the licensingers as you are with the emts as well . In terms of licensing licensures . In our state we have a lot of people who are licensed as emts who are not working as emts so i think weve got a good pool of people to draw upon. But im not sure i understand your question exactly. I think it relates to the fact that we expedited the licensure of some nurses physicians, in fact, that number has gone up than what we did with the nurses and so we will look in that licensure requirement for the emt and if its needed, well certainly try to expedite that, thats something that well measure the need and what we can do to increase those the capacity for those in the field. Lets do here, and then back to mike. Restrictions on casinos expire tomorrow, is that right . They will be extended. [laughs] mike. Dr. Smith, there was discussion at the National Level about projections and deaths. Do you guys have projections on deaths for arkansas . We dont have a formal projection on deaths for arkansas. Theres a lot of things that go into that equation. And we are still learning in the u. S. What we should estimate as our case fatality rate. The proportion of those infected who ultimately die. Probably a more practical ratio is the number of hospitalized individuals who will not make it, and i think thats going to be different in the u. S. Than it has been in some other countries. So yes, weve been looking at deaths as an estimate, but we dont have a formal projection. Question on testing. The New York Times compiled some data and it showed that arkansas is one of the five worst states for per capita testing. How do you feel about that and whats keeping us from doing more testing . Well, i would like to see that article and that actually surprises me, because we have really worked early in terms of developing of our Testing Capacity and its expanded. I will acknowledge as every small state thats not new york or california or illinois or new orleans that every state is not thats not a hot spot is struggling to get we have the equipment, it is to get the testing kits that we need to be able to do the testing. And so that is our challenge. Thats why i was on the phone with multiple labs today saying can you move us up in priority in terms of getting those testing kits . So we rely upon the private sector labs. We rely upon u. [captioner transition] we can measure our current testing. We do want to increase that capacity. Did you want to add to that . I want to see the numbers on that. We have done quite few tests if you count department of health and also the commercial lab. There are some of our neighboring states that are in much worse situation. They ran out of it. This is a problem across multiple states not just ours. [indiscernible] the backlog is not at the department of health lab. Its not at the umas lab. Its with some of the commercial labs. Lab corps and quest were some of the first to announce theyll be doing this kind of testing. They operate really across the country. I think they got more samples than they could possibly do. I think they have stopped doing this. Now theyre back on again. Some of the smaller ones have had pretty good turn around time. Weve gotten results from them within two days. Its not the same across all commercial labs but depending on which lab a hospital or clinic was sending to, they might have significant backlogs with that commercial lab. How many tests waiting to be analyzed . Unfortunately i have no way of knowing the sample that have been sent off and not yet been analyzed. We find out about those at the department of health when lab results come to us. We have Electronic Laboratory reporting. Have people been playing basketball . I think that the governor wants to play basketball by himself. Preferably. Im doing that by myself outside. You can see me practice little bit. Ive given up my friday game with 10 people full court basketball. Thats probably, well, thats vacuum in my life. We give up things. Thats important. Based on the numbers youve seen so far and the models and projections, are you seeing are you consider strengthening your directives your recommendations regarding groups and gatherings . We measure it everyday. Dr. Smith and i look at what we need to do based upon the data that we have. As i said yesterday our rate of hospitalization cases are not accelerating the rate. We see in earth other states. Well continue to measure that. We look at everyday what we need to tighten up. I think were doing the right thing right now. I also want to say that we continue to look the our modeling and i hope that tomorrow well have an update on where we are and where we see us going. On that nursing home, what was the where residents test positive . In terms of details on the Nursing Homes, we did have a single case at a nursing home in green acres nursing home. We will be testing with the others. We have a plan to test all the residents and workers there. So far we have the one positive resident. We have had some additional cases. We had two additional cases at whitehall and the others have remained the same. [indiscernible] total of six in whitehall. [indiscernible] we an additional employee at whitehall. That is the only additional worker that weve had since i reported yesterday. Whitehall total . Yes. Do you know any of the infected nurses were wearing protective gear . Or any healthcare person. I dont have information on that. I know that all the places that have cases now the workers have been trained and provided what they need to protect themselves. These exposures likely occurred before the first case was identified. Do we know how many people were on ventilators at the one point . In terms of total that have been on ventilators, i have that information. I dont have it with me. At this point. Ill come back with that information later. Anything special emphasis for suggestions for women who are carrying or whos delivering imminent [indiscernible] we havent seen worse outcomes in pregnant women who are infected with covid19 nor have we seen risk to tear babies. Were watching that carefully. We dont have a lot of experience with that. Theres been some press about women coming in who are pregnant and not being systematic for covid19. But then later testing positive. That can occur really with anyone. Someone can come in the hospital without symptoms but actually be incubating infection. At this point, weve not seen correlation between covid19 infection and adverse pregnancy outcomes. Were watching that carefully. Will you be giving information if someone test positive from high contact area like walmart, Grocery Store gas station . Our contact investigation suggest that a large exposure, well take whatever appropriate actions are. If its a situation where we can directly contact the individuals who have been exposed, we do that because thats the most effective way. If its a setting where we cant, we would put out a press release so those who did have that exposure, could come forward. Up date on unemployment claims that have been filed . How that system still working . We had over 30,000 claims that were filed and processed up until this weekend. I dont know what the latest number is today. I do know that theres still an excess demand in terms of being able to get through our telephone lines and again we call on people to be patient. Were trying to upgrade our i. T. System. We brought in extra resources and personnel to process those claims and to answer the calls. Well continue to monitor that. [indiscernible] we got to report coming up soon. Our april report will be out in matter of days. Again, theres no indication that this month collections will be off target because were one month behind. The first month impact will be next month. If i anticipate this month well be fine. Were in an unprecedented time, are you expecting to have a revised fiscal year 2021 budget to present to the legislature on first day of fiscal session . I met over the weekend with secretary walter and his budget team. There will be a need to revise next years budget. Let me get my language right. Be a need to revise the revenue forecast. The budget that we presented is based upon the Revenue Stabilization act and that should work fine even though the revenue forecast might be lower and it will be lower to some extent. We havent got those exact numbers. Secretary walter will release that whenever he has that action. Before the fiscal session . That should be before the fiscal session. One last question. [indiscernible] i expect landlords, bankers to act responsibly and compassionately during this time. Everything i have indicates that they are. If we see problems out there or unfair behavior, we will take another look at that. I think the marketplace is working as it should with compassion under these circumstances. Well continue to look at that and see what needs to be done in the future. If we decide were at the peak at some point, say six weeks down the line and we start to see a significant dropoff when do you decide to say that we can go out and about again . What is the lesson from china or whatever youre getting this . You dont want to release too quick. Thats based upon the guidance of dr. Smith and National Experts as well. Well make those judgments. Thank you very much. Coming up governor Massachusetts GovernorCharlie Baker will give an update on his states effort to respond to the coronavirus. That will be live at 2 00 p. M. Eastern. Later today, louisiana governor John Bel Edward will talk about the increase in coronavirus cases in his state, live coverage of that begins at 3 30 eastern. Reminder you can watch all of our coverage online at cspan. Org. Listen with the free cspan radio app. If you miss any of our live coverage of the government response to the coronavirus outbreak, watch it any time at cspan. Org coronavirus. From daily briefings by the president and the White House Task force, to updates from governors of the hardest hit state. Its all there. Use the charts and maps to track the viruses global spread and confirm cases in the u. S. County by county. Our coronavirus web page is your fast and easy way to watch cspans unfiltered coverage of this pandemic. House majority leader steny hoyer sent out a letter to the colleagues. He wrote, i do not expect the house to reconvene prior to april 20 2020. Well listen to the advice from medical experts when we can proceed with the business of congress in washington. Its not possible to give a definitive return date. In the meantime, we will continue working from our districts on behalf of the american people. Clearly, theres much work to be done. Well make decisions on the future schedule of the house as soon as the facts allow. Thats from House Majority leader steny hoyer. We turn to zoom now bringing you congressman Paul Mitchell from the tenth district of michigan. Congressman good morning to you sir. Tell us about the coronavirus in your corner of michigan. How is the tenth district this morning . Guest tenth district is a tenth state of hot spot. We have fair number of cases in some of them are going to negative outcome. Were working hard to have it under control. I think i