Murphy gave an update on his states response to the coronavirus, saying the death toll and the number of cases continue to rise. He talks about the backlog in testing and criminal charges for violating social distancing rules. Gov. Murphy good afternoon. Table byd at the head the woman to my right who needs no introduction, the commissioner of the department of health, Judith Persichilli. To her right, the state epidemiologist. Honored to have you both with us. Farleft, the state Police Superintendent patrick callahan, as usual. The director of Homeland Security protected nest. Also joining us today is the department of children and families commissioner. Great to have you. Thanks for being here. Ive asked her to provide an update on the order for of childcare facilities to provide services only to the kids of our frontline responders and essential workers and i should note and i know she will note this, april is also National Child abuse awareness month. In times like these, when there is tremendous uncertainty and stress and anxiety, children can be at risk of abuse. It is a horrible reality, but it exists. The department of children and families has a host of Resources Available to survivors of abuse. Positive test results, bringing our statewide total to 25,590. Positiveat is 3489 test results, bringing our statewide total to 23,590. Judy in her remarks will get into some of the details of those positives, as well as negatives. Additionally, we must report with the heaviest of hearts that we have lost another 182 members of our new jersey family to covid19related complications. Of 537 now lost a total precious souls. Their memories are in our prayers. God rest each and every one of them. Andprayers and thoughts sympathies go out to their family and friends. Some moregive you dimension on this and some more color, but as a headline, as a teaser to when you speak, judy you should not assume that 182 people passed since yesterdays press conference. There is a lag in terms of confirming cause of death in particular. Judy will get into that in detail. Every of these lives is a life lost. Let me be unequivocal about that. These seven of how actually transpired and these blessed folks have left us, i think i would just say as a nonmedical professional, you need to think of this over a span of days. Particularly given the stress we have on the system. That is more true than ever. I think judy will tell us that even in a normal, regular time lageace that there is a associated with this and there is an overwhelming challenge, as you can imagine right now, given the stress we are going through. One of those precious lives lost was kim king smith, an ekg technician at University Hospital in newark. Look at her blessed picture. She worked the night shift and was part of the University Hospital family for 13 years. And i might add, who know when interim basis, Judith Persichilli ran University Hospital and was the head of that organization. We have not spoken about that enough. As the current University Hospital president , a true friend to those of us up here, as he noted, her family is saying her smile was and i quote her family more infectious than the virus that took her life she was a frontline hero. God bless her and god rest her soul. If we had our druthers, we would speak about each and every one of the single lives each and every single one of these lives. We cant, but i want folks to know that that would be our preference if we could. Each one of them is in our hearts and prayers. We also lost a veteran Hudson County sheriffs officer. I had the opportunity there he is god bless that guy. I have the opportunity to speak with his wife and his son also a member of Law Enforcement. Yesterday afternoon. To extend our condolences and appreciation for his 28 years of service. He too was a frontline hero. I also spoke with the Hudson County sheriff and Exchange Notes. This is not abstract for them, not for so many. We also lost an awardwinning musician and songwriter, there is a good shot of adam bless his heart. A Founding Member of fountains of wayne, which not only made its mark, but whose very name memorialize the iconic store on route 3 that he remembered from his youth. He was jersey through and through. And the likes of our arts scene are a little dimmer today. Everyp each of them and single one of these lives in our hearts and our prayers. Again, every Single Member of our great new jersey family who we have lost. May each of their memories provide strength to the families and friends left behind. And as they say in the jewish tradition, may each of their memories be a blessing. Again, i know these numbers are stark. They are certainly sobering. They are shocking and they are indeed sad. Intosaid, judy will get giving you some sense as to how this is really building over a period of days. I want to say this. We can lower these numbers and we will. We can see fewer of our new jersey family pass because of covid19. Is byy we do that aggressively and continually practicing our social distancing, even under the most extreme of circumstances. In fact, i and my team have spoken with and Exchange Notes i literally just exchanged one with them in the last hour with the passaic mayor. There great fire chief and the state fmba president , the passaic fmba president. Onfered a tremendous loss monday with the death from covid19 complications of a young fireman. I mentioned that i had spoken to his widow and spoke to her about his life and their children and how they were doing. They obviously wanted to be part of a proper sendoff for their fallen brother. But as we discussed, this is not an ordinary time. It just simply cant be done. The Passaic Fire Department will pay their respects by driving past the funeral home to let the firefighters family know they are there with them in spirit. Once this emergency ends and it will and we will come through this together they will gather as one to memorialize him. This is leading by example. Even in the most painful times. If you do not need to be out, then we need you to stay at home. Please, god, stayathome. Even when you are at home, keep your distance between yourself and other Family Members. We need to make sure we are doing all we can to support the folks who we need working the front lines in which every central jobs they have i want to give a particular big shout out today to all of our transit workers on both the bus, the rail, the support side, who are helping many a our essential frontline workers actually get to their jobs. By doing so, they are also heroes, they are also at the front lines. Now, i know it is a beautiful day. I know you want to get outside and go for a walk or a run or talk with your neighbors. You can do that. But only at a distance. Keep that critical minimal sixfoot distance between you and anybody else. If you are out for a run, give others you pass a wider birth. As we keep ourselves healthy, we keep others healthy. And we do our best to flatten that curve that we have looked at so often. We are all in this together. Do it for yourself. Do it for your family. Do it for your community. And frankly, do it in memory of the likes of kim and bernard and adam and israel and everyone else we have lost. It is what we need to do. Please. , switching gears, as we often do appear. This morning, colonel pat callahan and i had the opportunity to tour the field medical station, which i believe is the formal station name for what is temporarily a Field Hospital being set up at the meadowlands exposition hospital in secaucus. We were joined on our tour by senator bob menendez and i cannot say enough good things about senator menendez and senator booker and our entire congressional delegation in fighting for our state in washington throughout this emergency. By the way, the fight is not remotely done. I were joined by the commanding general of the u. S. Army corps of engineers north atlantic division, Major General jeffrey mill horn, who has become a good friend, and Lieutenant Colonel david park, who set about where elise and john are sitting today. Give colonelo callahan and the troopers a big shout out for their extraordinary efforts. That site with a minimal, depending on how they can figure it, it is configured for 250 beds right now it is nearly ready to be put into service. I think theyre going to have a soft opening, as they say in the retail business, on monday. I want to thank our partners, the state troopers, and the administration for availing this Necessary Service to us. This is the first of what will such field three medical stations in our state with edison and Atlantic City to follow, which will expand our bed capacity by at least 1000 beds in total. Kelly sioner percy hillis briefing will show, they are coming online at not a moment too soon. It will be 500 beds there with edison together. We will need not only the capacity, but the great flexibility these sites will afford. Our brick and mortar hospitals in the coming weeks. I want to give a shout out at this time to United Health care, which is dedicating two of its senior folks to work with the department of health to assist us in our efforts. We are proud to welcome the Senior Vice President of uniteds Clinical Redesign Team and the president and ceo of clinical redesign. Dr. Brenner is a family position by training. Kathleens career has focused on improving the overall delivery of health care. They will join us for the next 90 days and we do welcome them. We are proud to welcome them to our team and we know they will hit the ground running. I exchanged a nice note yesterday with United Health ceo and thanked him personally for the assist, which is big. Of course, we continue our work to get the equipment and supplies of all of our Health Care Providers and workers need from all possible sources, including the federal government, our federal government partners, our state supply caches, individual and corporate donors, as well as private sector procurement. Today, im signing, to that end, and executive order formally authorizing colonel pat callahan to commandeer medical supplies that are necessary for our covid19 response. This may run the gamut from n95 masks and of the personal protective equipment to ventilators and everything in between. While we look forward to these facilities cooperating with us in providing us equipment as needed, this order gives pat the express authority to requisition it for distribution to our acutecare hospitals and other health care facilities. Needless to say, they badly need the equipment. But we also all certainly hope that pat does not have to use this authority. We would hope that folks would step forward and do the right thing, but if need be, we will use this authority. Speaking of people stepping forward, additionally on the topic of ppe, we learned that horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield has committed to donating a 500,000 n95 masks and 81,000 face shields to our response efforts. That is more than 2. 3 million worth of supplies. The supplies will be delivered throughout the month of april. Is also also making both a 100,000 donation to the Community Food bank of anation new jersey and 60,000 donation to the service of cape may. It is not just our Frontline Health care workers and First Responders certainly and other essential workers who need our help, but that there are also countless everyday new jerseyans and their families we can forget. I think horizon for remembering that our entire new jersey family needs help. I mentioned that article in the new york times, quoting one source that 70 of the people pulling up to food banks in that certain area were doing so for the first time in their lives. Horizon has told us this all amounts to the largest single donation the company has made in its 88 years. To kevin conlon and their entire team, bless you and thank you. If you have any ppe to donate, please get in touch with us through our onestop online portal and had to ppedonations. V we will gladly accept your donation no matter large or small. Every little bit counts. I also cited that administrative order permitting blood drives to continue to ensure we can meet the critical medical needs of our residents. Judy spoke eloquently to this a most mustgo and undertake appropriate mitigation efforts to prevent the spread of covid19, incorporating social distancing where practicable. Switching gears again for a quick note on testing. Partnered public drivethrough sites, a reminder , one willrow, april 3 be open. The pnc site will be closed. Testing at Bergen Community college will begin at 8 00 a. M. And you must be a new jersey resident and exhibiting symptoms of respiratory illness. Do not meet either of these requirements, you will not be tested. Let me repeat this. In a perfect world, i would love to be south korea. I would love to have unlimited supplies from the feds that which we need to collect the specimens. I would love to have unlimited personal protective equipment. I would love to have unlimited supply of Health Care Workers to be able to test everybody and care for those who are sick. We dont live in that world. We live in a world of limited resources, particularly coming out of the federal side. We are grateful for what weve got, but it is a fraction of what we need. We made a decision from the getgo that we needed to test those exhibiting symptoms. For the obvious reasons that these folks are sick, whether or not they have covid19 to be determined. It turns out six in 10 do not have it, approximately. That is an important point to make. For the folks who do have it, we can be much more aggressive treating their symptoms. As im reminded, even if they dont have covid19, they are sick. They are not superman or superwoman, they have to take care of themselves. But that also gives our Health Care Professionals a highquality trove of data that we need. I know folks would like to say, wouldnt it be nice if you had a spread between symptomatic. Asymptomatic . In a perfect world, yes. We dont live in a perfect world. Additionally, i think this is places at3 different a minimum. The Mercer County is now appointmentonly testing site in Lawrence Township for county residents. This is open weekdays 8 00 a. M. Until 4 00 p. M. To receive an appointment, your doctor must send notification to the site that you meet testing requirements and are symptomatic. You have to be symptomatic. Those who show up without an appointment will not be tested. If you live in Mercer County and you are symptomatic, please contact your primary care provider. We have a comprehensive list of all publicly available testing sites, not just what i holed up in my hand. It is online at our onestop portal. Scroll down for the covid19 testing information or go direct v testing. 9. Nj. Go it is a little bit of an eyechart, but it is at the bottom. Again, for all testing coming you must be symptomatic. Switching gears again. Please, if you could bear with me. Highlighting a couple of announcements from elsewhere in our administration. Department of labor reported that over the past week more than 206,000 new claims for unemployment were filed, meaning that in just the past two weeks alone, more than 362,000 residents have filed for unemployment. You no doubt saw the national numbers. Also recordsetting. We are also very cognizant that there are delays and backups in the system and we urge everyone to please have patience and that your claim will be taken care of and you will not lose one penny of your benefits. But on the other hand, we do have literally thousands of opportunities for employment. At the central workplace listed online. If you want to work and help us as part of our response team, please visit again covid19. Nj. Gov and click on the link for jobs portal on the search bar or go directly to jobs. Covid 19. Nj. Gov. We think the 500 employers who have worked with us to put their available jobs online. I dont know what the number looks like today, but yesterday i believe it was 44,000 job offerings on that website. It was multiple tens of thousands of job openings. Next. The department of education. Njtv and the new Jersey Education Association have partnered to begin learning live , and new Public TelevisionProgram Featuring lessons taught by new jerseys tremendous educators. Best in the nation, best in the world. Starting on monday, each hourlong Weekday Program will offer programs for grades three through six and will cover subjects including english Language Arts math, science, social studies and will also include art, music, and physical education. Thirdgrade instruction will begin at 9 00 a. M. , fourth grade at 10 00 a. M. , fifth grade at 11 a. M. , and sixth grade at noon. Third grade at 9 00 a. M. , fourth grade at 10 00 a. M. , fifth grade at 11 00 a. M. , sixth grade at noon. All will be aired at njtv. I cannot think enough njtv and njea for working with our commissioner and his team at the department of education and especially again a huge shout out to all of our extraordinary educators up and down the state. Switching gears again. Office hasnerals made public what i would like to refer to as the first members of knucklehead row, six individ