vaccine distribution in west virginia. with those rorpgs that we don't have, this number is probably significantly higher than the 17. 17 is way, way, way too many, i could, with all due respect, read through these i'll now.y do that right a 1,247th death is 70-year-old female from jefferson county. 68-year-old female from kabul county. county. -- campbell county. ur 1,250th death is an male.r-old a 66-year-old female. 1,222nd death is a 63-year-old male from jefferson county. 1,253rd death is a 77-year-old female from preston county. 1,254th death, a 90-year-old female. our 1,255th death, an 0-year-old male from hampshire county. 90-year-old death, a male. our 1,257th death, an 85-year-old male. an 1,258th death, 89-year-old female. 1,259th death, a male. 1,260th, a 90-year-old female. 1,261st death, an 82 beyond all reasonable doubt female. ---year-old female. 1,262th death, a male. again.ad that ur 1,262th death, an 80-year-old male. our 1,263rd death, a 94-year-old from hampshire county. that totals 1,263 great west virginians we've lost. know, in addition to losing i call eat people that through and go their -- the staff, you know, female, counties all state, their age, rings everywhere and i hope and pray you will have many, many prayers for them. but in addition to this, you know, we have now been at another level of catastrophe that has happened in west virginia. we lost a national guard senior airman. his name was logan young. logan is 30 years old. he is a firefighter for the 167th wing in martinsburg. the way this all works and everything, i guess we contract or have relationships with counties or whatever like that where our guard firefighters go and help and assist in fire emergencies that we have. well, over this christmas time, logan answered the call. like logan has done since 2018 when he joined the guard. he was a combat veteran that was previously deployed to the middle east. the residence of martinsburg and survived by his mom and dad, brother, fiancé. a fiancee that is having a little baby not very long. logan and this beautiful girl have been together for a long time. i talked to his dad yesterday, and his dad talked about they planning and been and have or six years been planning for so many things for their life ahead. that logan, in this fire he responded to, and from what i a erstand, it was a fire at barn, and in responding to this a beam fell on logan and killed him. the tragedy beyond belief in this is the state fire marshal's office has determined the cause of the fire to be arson. and continues to investigate the west elp of virginia state police and is of us all that if you have any information, please, please call the state fire marshal's office for the state police. there is a reward of $5,000 that has been posted. you know -- again, it's just -- it's just terrible. it's just plain terrible. i said this many, many times. we cannot let these people, and we cannot let logan and his family go unnoticed, and we cannot let them feel alone. we cannot do it. them for hink about just a day and forget about them in weeks and weeks to come. that.'t do we've got to know and they've here. know that we'll be we'll be here, and we'll be here themr watch trying to help in any way we possibly can. you know, what an incredible young man, who served our nation, and really i have said it over and over and over, and isn't it ever so true, that especially our military, we owe everything we have to them, do we not? do we not? is it not just that simple? really and truly. look across the globe at all the other countries. think about what we have in this country. who do we owe it to? we owe it to our military. we owe it to logan, and we owe it to his family. we owe it to his little baby to be and his fiancée. we owe them, and we should not forget it. in regard to our numbers, our testing is somewhat skewed and everything because the number of tests we did and all this kind of stuff over the holiday and all that. the net of the whole thing is just this. you know, our cumulative is now 4.66, and it continues to go up. our total active cases are a little over 24,000. we are right at 56,000 people that have recovered. the number of people hospitalized are 720. that is up a little bit. 200 patients in the icu unit. yesterday we only tested 4000, a little better than 4000 people in west virginia and there are been testing have 12,000 and 14,000. so those numbers are a little skewed because of that. 1.13, we're ers, the second worst in the whole country. the number of orange counties and red counties, we now have 52 that are in the orange and red. there is no question that we have a real-life problem in west virginia, do we not? but the problem is everywhere. the problem is all across america. even as tough as this problem is in west virginia, it is only a fraction of what it is across america. now, there is no question that we are in for good days ahead and we are in for some tough days ahead. let me just tell you, as point-blank as i can possibly tell you, every single person that we get vaccinated, every single person that has the vaccine will help and help and help. the more we vaccinate, the faster we are going to get well. the faster we are going to stop this thing. the more we wear our masks and protect ourselves, the faster we are going to stop it. if you want this thing to absolutely get like a horror film, all we have got to do is stop wearing our masks and sit on the sidelines and wait for it all to happen. this thing is not going to go away. science, all of our work, the good lord above are going to make it go away. when it is your time to get vaccinated, you have got to run to the fire. absolutely, if you're over 65 ears of age and you get a sniffle, you have got to immediately run to the fire and get a test. if you get a test and we catch this within the first few days, we will give you antibodies that will absolutely, probably in every way, make you well. if you don't, you have got a high chance of dying. it is just that simple. if you are in excess of 65 years of age and you let this thing go and go and think i've just got a headache or i just got the flu or i just got a sniffle or whatever it may be, i'm just really tired but i've been working real hard and everything, and maybe i didn't sleep good last night and you just let it go, and you put it off, and you put it off long enough, six or seven days from when it started, there is not much that these antibodies will do to help you. then you are going to be fighting for your life, trying to figure out how to breathe, how to just breathe. you are not going to be able to half your loved ones at your side. you are going to be fighting for your life and trying to figure out how to breathe. so if you get the least bit sick, and you are 65 years of age, you feel the least it bit different, please go get a test. we are offering free testing all over the place. it may be inconvenient, but it may very well save your life. with that, you know, i have had the vaccine now for a couple weeks and feel great, no issue whatsoever there. there have been 30,737 doses administered in west virginia. we are still leading the nation in distribution and administration. that is really good, and we owe so much to our health officials and national guard. that is really, really good. we are at 50.49% of the total number of doses that have been given to west virginia that have been stuck in somebody's arm. the total doses that we have for vaccine in west virginia right now are 60,875, and we are pushing it out the door as fast as we can. get absolutely vaccinated. the closest state to our 50.49%, the closest state as far as getting it done and getting it done fast is maine, and they're at 37%. they are so far behind that we cannot even see them back there. that is how good the national guard and our health officials are doing. we are expecting to receive a moderna shipment today in four of our five hub locations. we expect pfizer product today and tomorrow as well. in total, we will be receiving 25,925 doses this week. and it just goes on and on. we move toward vaccinating the people that are, you know not only the nursing homes and the elderly and all that. we want to stay on top of every bit of that. all of our health community and first responders and everything. but we are also vaccinating those that are giving us the shot and absolutely vaccinating vaccinators. we can be assured that we have the network in place to be able to take care of you, take care of our government, take care of our hospitals and everything. those people will be protected and be there for you. when we got a problem. west virginia is also leading the nation in disturbing covid-19 vaccines to our nursing homes and assisted living. we took a slightly different approach than most of the states went through, and we are very hopeful to complete the first doses within the first month of when we got them. one of our priorities was always led with going back to april when we focused on testing and long-term care facilities, taking care of the most vulnerable first. we are making significant progress in our plan to offer vaccinations to all long-term care facility residents and staff, and should be complete with all 214 facilities in the state today. amazing. far ahead of everybody else in the nation. that is 100% of our long-term care facilities that we will have offered vaccine to in our state and before some other states have even been -- have even gotten started. so the bottom line is this. we are hopeful today to have all 214 of our facilities within our states that we have offered vaccine up to. that is our nursing homes and long-term care facilities. the really, really important -- i mean, that is amazing. ven more impactful is just this. the amount of people that we have in west virginia, in our nursing homes and assisted living in comparison to other states, states like texas or are twice as many -- not twice as many total people percentage-wise, twice as many people are in our nursing omes and assisted living than in a place like texas. unbelievable an job. again, take your hats off to the health officials, national guard, all the great stuff that they're doing. i remind you quickly that you will not get covid from the vaccine. pfizer and moderna are saying over and over and over how safe these vaccines are, and the other thing i would tell you is just this. out are a lot of people there in the network that are, you know, coming up with vaccines. the problem with those additional vaccines, where pfizer and moderna's rate of everything is like 95%, equivalent to taking smallpox vaccine, you know, of success is 95%. some of the other vaccines are falling in at 70%. so when the pfizer and moderna vaccines are offered, you've got to take them. you really got to take advantage that. and the faster we get them gone in somebody's arm, the more get. it's just as simple as that. we kind of sputter along and we got plenty in stock, you bet theu can -- you can federal government's going to say, no point sending more to west virginia today. over in los sis angeles or whatever, we'll send angeles.os we want absolutely to get all of you vaccinated. of know, from a standpoint our antibodies and so on and what i'm is is thinking -- talking about. if you especially are 65 -- but you don't have to be 65, you could be whatever age. but if you get this and we catch it really early, right now in west virginia we have 1400 of these doses that are out there all over the place that you can get. in addition, we have 600 more that are supposed to arrive immediately. and we are trying to get this into people's hands not only in the hospitals, but in the people's hands who are really close at the nursing films, -- at the nursing homes, at the pharmacies, where you can get these drugs from your doctor, get these drugs very quickly because hours really mean something. not just days. i talk to you a whole lot about getting tested. you've got to continue getting tested. here is all the pretesting stuff that ought to be up on the website, the drive through pharmacy stuff. we appreciate all these great people and the work they have done. our school outbreaks -- we have nine active outbreaks now and 35 total cases in our school system. the obvious is that in a lot of places that we are not going to school in west virginia. still, what an incredible job has been done right there. these schools have been a safe haven. long-term care facilities, we have 113 outbreaks, 16 utbreaks in 14 counties and are greenbrier, jackson, lewis, mcdowell, nicholas, raleigh, summers, webster, and wyoming counties. we go over and over the same thing. if it saves one life, i have said this a thousand times -- what is a life worth? if it saves one life, one person listens -- go to church, keep a pew between you -- keep social distancing between you -- other than somebody in your immediate home. other than that, wear your mask in church the whole time. wash your hands. but if you are 65 and older, i would highly, highly encourage you to just take a few weeks off from church, get your services online, and someway, somehow, buy some time to get to the point in time we can vaccinate you. from the standpoint of corrections, we have 488 now. we have bumped up big time as far as active cases. -- active inmate cases. as ave bumped and it's typical as it always is. once it gets somewhere, this thing grabs. mary's.285 now at st. we have 77 in our eastern regional jail, 55 in our central and 50 at tigrate and there are 49 cases statewide. we have begun an additional 25% testing of our staff at corrections every week. these people have done an amazing work as well. as far as wearing your face covering and so on like that, that is an executive order that is mandated. really commend you, because across west virginia, you 97% ofy were probably at eople that are going in public buildings or whatever are going with the mask. well, to be perfectly honest, when we started this thing, dr. marsh would have been jumping through hoops and everything and really happy about that. 97%, why can'tet we get 100%? you know, when it really boils we have some it, people, you know, some folks that are still probably hung up that may r principles be, but i keep going back to the same thing. you know, if i don't believe in these masks, i don't think they work, and i don't believe that somebody ought to mandate for me to wear them, let me just make it real simple. i don't believe in it, and i don't think it's right. please tell me one thing. what does it hurt to do it? what does it hurt? what if it didn't do anything to make things better, and surely the goodness -- it doesn't have anything to do with your rights or taking away your guns are -- or taking away something. what does it hurt? what does it hurt to wear this mask? and i will promise you this, if you think that what i said, it doesn't do any good, and that it is you're right, your thinking wrong.re thinking that's all there is to it. you don't have a right to drive drunk just because that is what you want to do. we are a nation of laws. it is not -- we are not going to take away your rights, we are not going to shut down the whole world, we are not going to take your guns. this isn't the first steppingstone to something that is really bad, but within all of me i tell you, i tell you just what has been told to me over and over -- you cannot imagine how many people that have said, by god, i ain't wearing them masks. it is my right, i'm not wearing that mask. and the next go round, probably, later i three weeks sick.charlie is charlie's got covid. and the next thing i hear is a message from one of his loved ones that says, "will you please tell the people i was wrong? will you please tell the people, me not wearing a mask was all wrong? this stuff is not the flu, this is the worst thing i have ever my life."gh in thing the most cases, sad is slow walking because charlie is no longer with us. mask.r your get your flu vaccine. give blood and plasma especially if you have had this. we need the blood. sure. for the red cross is fabulous, fabulous good work. our president signed the covid relief bill, the stimulus package, and i will just outline a little bit about this real quickly. the net of the whole thing is just this. you know, there is no point in me saying anything but this. d.c. -- and these people, ou know, our senators, our congresspeople and everything that are all across our land in don't you just think that we cannot do better? we cannot do better than what we are doing? not to slight the people as not being good people, why in the world have we had so many people hurting for so long? world now do we come up with a bill that's passed have been passed forever ago, and why, why in it of stuff all kinds that has nothing to do with just -- it's stuffed in there in the back door so we can get something and somebody can get something else and somebody can get something and this and that? political. political. political. thank goodness we have passed something. we got too many people and too many businesses that are hurting. this.hey did in it was they extended the cares money deadline, and we'll have to now. we had all set for how we were going to bucket every single money and it ares was all working. now -- now what we should do is pivot again, because we got deep dive money where e're paying ourselves back and everything. e have ways and everything now to do additional things going forward and so we pivot again. the rules have changed and you pivot again. as far as the direct payments, they are going to make $600 direct payments to individuals making below $75,000 a year, and 1,200 for couples that are making below $150,000 a year. plus an additional $600 per child. it eally and truly, the way boils down and everything, if you're a couple making $150,000 to get you're going $1,200. and the way i read it, you'll get another $600 for every child. that is just a subsidy payment directly to the people. you know, there is going to be an enhanced employment benefit of $300 a week, you know, that is going to be extended for 11 more weeks, and that is in addition to what you receive in your unemployment check. there's $319 billion for small usinesses, including $284 billion that's going to go back to the p.p.p. program. justthe p.p.p. program was this. and i'm sure the way this works, and everything now, people that signed up for the paycheck thatction program, the way happened, it was all devised to help you pay your labor and to get you through this time. this time frame. think it's going to work it's going to work just like this. you're restaurant abc. time d a payroll at one and everything, your expected a number.s -- pick month.0 a our analyzed payroll was, i'm sorry, $100,000 a year. so what you would do then is you would multiply that, in some cases by 3.5 times, but in most cases by three times, and you would receive dollars. annual payroll, payroll.yzed three times, $100,000 or $300,000. do then with that money is pay your people, pay benefits for their and their labor, pay that money out that way. so it is a direct payment and it is to be forgiven. up to a certain amount it was to be forgiven. so i am sure all across west virginia we had businesses after businesses after businesses what i'm telling you right now is by chance you were one of those that fell through apply, forand didn't god's sake, apply. it may very well not work, but it may very well work. and every dollar that we can bring in to this state is a dollar that will help our economy in every way. apply, apply. now, if you had applied before, now and reapply again. because that's exactly what for. dollars are exactly, exactly what these dollars are for. from the standpoint there will be $25 billion in rental assistance with the extension of the eviction moratorium, there will be $82 billion for schools and universities with $10 childcare.icated to $7 billion for increased access to broadband, and additional funding to facilitate the vaccine distribution. i have not seen all the 2,000 pages. through haven't been the 2,000-plus pages of what this all is and everything, but pretty much a breakdown. i will go through that really quick one more time and everything. there is an extension to the existing cares funding through our state and local governments. there is, you know, a direct all individuals for time.ne to people making $75,000 or less. couple and make $150,000 or less, it's $1,200. an additional $600 per child. ou know, there's enhanced unemployment benefits. so if you're getting unemployment benefits now, you of an additional weeks additional $300 a week. check.our unemployment you know, our small businesses, -- of $319 billion course, nobody can understand the magnitude of that money. i couldn't begin to understand it. imagine that $1 million is all the money in the world. billion, $1 billion is $1,000 million. $1,000 million. thatere's $318,000 million will go for our small businesses and that's for the paycheck program.on so apply. going in 5 billion rental assistance and extension on the eviction moratorium has extended. there's $82 billion going to universities. $10 billion that will be dedicated to childcare. 7 billion is for increased access to broadband. and there's going to be all -- and the funding will be there the vaccine distribution. scott atkins with workforce is with us today, and he wants to talk about the unemployment benefits. that's all i've got. i will turn it over to scott. scott: all right. hank you -- >> all right. thank you, governor. we'll go to scott atkins, director of workforce west virginia. scott: as governor justice said, president trump signed the new covid relief bill last night, provisionsome of the of the cares act. i want to go through those pretty quickly. components e major that affect west virginians. keep in mind, workforce is on guidance from usdol on how these programs will work. i want to give you the framework of what those extensions entail. first of all, the pandemic compensation, pupc, initially folks were eligible for 13 weeks. it expired this past saturday. the extension that president trump signed will provide an additional 11 weeks for a maximum of 24 weeks. ppuc will be available this weekend ending the week of march 13. if you are eligible -- if you are receiving any extended benefits, you don't need to do anything at all. workforce will start making those payments. once the guidance is in place for usdol, we will come back on and share additional information with you. keep doing your weekly certifications. do.ou normally would governor justice alluded to it pandemic he federal unemployment compensation. any of you remember folks were eligible for an extra $600 a week between the weeks of march 29 and july 25 -- under extension of the cares act, you will be eligible for an additional 11 weeks of $300 per week. so the $300 will be on top of what your normal weekly benefit amount is. if you are receiving regular ui and your maximum weekly benefit you'll receive the $424 plus the $300. keep in mind, you have to be on unemployment to be eligible for the $300. it could be regular state unemployment, pua. it can be one of the trade programs. you have to be receiving some sort of unemployment to be weeks of or the 11 $300 per week. peuc, that program will end march 13 as well. last thing i'll mention is the pandemic employment assistance. for independent ontractors, self-employed folks. originally you were entitled up to 39 weeks for benefits. many of the folks available for p.u.a. exhausted their benefits y late november, early december. starting this week you will be eligible for an additional 11 weeks. whatever your weekly benefit amount was for p.u.a. see that moving forward. in addition, you will receive a payment of $300. to make sure everybody understands, if your benefits have exhausted, you don't need to do anything at all other than continuing to file your weekly certifications on sunday. workforce will send those payments to you. once we get guidance from you. -- from usdol. thank you, and if you have any questions, feel free to call 1-800-252-jobs. >> next we will go with major general hoyer with the west virginia national guard. general ohio injury -- hoyer: good morning. i just want to reinforce what governor justice brought out to us regarding senior airman logan young. logan was responding to a fire as part of our mutually mutual aid agreement that we with the counties. logan spent a number of years on active duty, as the government -- governor pointed out, overseas. as his father told us last night n conversation, came back to the guard specifically to be a firefighter. his dad told us that that was what he always wanted to be in life. so he was doing what he loved to do. he epitomized what our guardsmen responders t epitomize and that's selfless service and dedication to our and our communities to make the world a better place. of all the 6,400 men and women of the national guard our families, to his dad, steve, mom, beth, brother, and fiancee london, we send our prayers, our thoughts, condolences. we will be with you from here forward, and you will always be a part of our west virginia national guard family. so god bless the young family and logan and his sacrifice and service to our state and our nation. related to our vaccine distribution, as the governor pointed out, we're moving rapidly forward toward long-term careur facilities, and we hope those today. finished if not today, then by the next couple of days. we have last week or this current week distributed 35,000-plus vaccines last week as part of our effort. we continue to process vaccines out for distribution today and are preparing for new shipments to come in this week. we spent a lot of effort this past weekend with senior leadership working on strategic planning and preparing things for the governor to review for final execution as well as dhhr and others to set up the appropriate infrastructure that we need the forward, not just for distribution, administration of he vaccine but for the general population for scheduling going forward as we get into these next groups. we appreciate all the effort and hard work of the various organizations, supporting the governor and the covid leadership team. greatly appreciate the work that is being done. thank you. >> thank you, general. next, dr. clay marsh, our coronavirus czar. morning.: well, good it's great to be with you. i also want to reinforce what the governor and general hoyer said. i think the fact that we are almost finished with the first vaccinations of our long-term care facilities is really a singular achievement that we should be really proud of. certainly notat's the end of what we need to do for certain, but the fact that operated like a single team, as the governor said, we all pulled the rope in direction. we certainly want to give a lot of credit to marty white, who is the lead of the long-term care ssociation and all the leadership for the long-term care facilities as well as the great relationships that we have as our interagency task forces ith the guard and dhhr, the pharmacies, the facilities, it eally is a great accomplishment. when you recognize the 47% or so of deaths come from long-term care facilities. as we look at the risk of dying from covid, we know that over 70-year-olds make up 77.5% of the age ranges of people who've from covid in west virginia and people 75 to 85 years old have a 220 to 630 imes risk of dying from covid-19 as compared to a 18 to age group, the group.-old and so as we start to look at what we're doing, we really are meeting the governor's commitment to the state of saving lives and reducing the severity of illness and people who will take up beds in our acute care hospitals so very well done. right now, we are really focusing on the next stage of our vaccination plan, as the general indicated. we're starting to look at moving from places where we have centralized populations like hospitals and nursing homes, long-term care facilities that have an infrastructure, have medically trained personnel to getting to other people in our critical workforce sectors and other health care sectors, as like home health and hospice and people that work in different parts of this health care industry, looking at an older part of these workforce populations of over 50 years old and then quickly, as the governor has instructed us to do, to move toward the most vulnerable parts of our population, the over 850-year-olds, the over 70-year-olds, the over 60-year-olds that make up 92% of age-wise p of people who have died in west virginia. so certainly getting to that population quickly is important. and to do that we have to have a different set of capabilities, a set of capabilities that has a footprint in every community and every place. what we're doing now, as the governor said, vaccinating the vaccinators, we're looking at the fqhc's, the federally qualified health centers that serve almost 500,000 west virginians as far as primary care and rural clinics and other assets that we can put vaccines in the communities really close to people who are in these other sectors in a more decentralized way. as we do this effectively, then, we will be able to reach each west virginian at their front door so that we can provide them this vital life-sustaining and protective intervention, the vaccine, and as the governor said, all of us have taken the vaccine, and i would say for me, i have no effect at all of taking it. my arm's not sore at all. and i want to make sure that people recognize that ultimately vaccines in people's arms is what we're really trying to do, vaccination, and for each person, when it's your time, you can't get the virus from the vaccine. the vaccine is incredibly protective, and we absolutely encourage and implore each west virginian to do this. and we want to make sure that we're doing this as a state so that we can stop the spread of that we can stop the spread of covid-19 and get back to the activities that we want to do. but in the meantime, it's really important that each person take the appropriate precautions with mask wearing and physical distancing because we also know this holiday season, the christmas holiday, the kwanzaa holiday, the new year's holiday coming up is a time of particular risk and the new incoming head of the centers for disease control is predicting that january, toward the end of january is going to be the most challenging time that we've seen in the u.s. but as west virginians, let's demonstrate the leadership that you have done to date amazingly and let's be the place that starts to stop that spread, both by getting vaccinated, and by doing the appropriate mask wearing, physical distancing, staying at home as much as possible during this really critical time. thank you. >> thank you, dr. marsh. now to our state health officer. dr. amjad: good morning. i just want to reiterate that, you know, as the holidays are approaching, we approaching, we just finished the holiday season of christmas, which is a good time to be with family and friends. and as new year's is approaching about three days from now, we do want to spend time with family, but we want to remind everyone if you celebrate with family members or friends that are not living in your household that it's a time that we can see an increase in covid-19 cases. if you can, spend that time doing some virtual or other ways to celebrate because we are going to see an increase in cases across the state as well as across the country. so you can check in with them virtually, we do remind people it's a time where people are isolated and may feel lonely but we do want to increase that awareness across the state as well. but if you are going to but if you are going to celebrate to remind yourselves to wear masks and to stay socially distant as much as possible. we do want you to enjoy the we will go to questions from members of the media. first is mark. >> thank you, governor. cabinet members. governor, i want to get clarity. is there specific money set aside in this latest cares act the president signed last night for reimbursement for state and local governments in addition to what we already had? governor justice: i don't think so, mark. i don't think so at all. and the reason, you know, i think what you're going to see is that's what, you know, our speaker pelosi has pushed and from the democrats' side, that's what they continue to push and really and truly what this came down to, to make it really simple, is just this. the republicans were really pushing hard for some kind of limited liability in regard to exposure. if you are at a restaurant and you picked up covid at the restaurant that you couldn't turn around and sue the restaurant owner. the republicans were pushing for that. the democrats were pushing for the democrats were pushing for basically an avalanche of money to go back and backfill cities and counties and pension plans and stuff like that that have happened, you know, decades ago. and try to make up for sins that were-decades-old. were decades old. and so that was the battleground there. and basically what finally got done is they removed those from the table at this point in time, they pushed out the door what i just said, i don't think there's any backfilling to cities and counties right now at all. and everything. but that doesn't mean that's not going to -- that's not going to everything. and but for right now, that's not in the bill. that's not in the stimulus package. >> all right. thanks, mark. next is steve adams. adams here.steve in relation to the question i asked last wednesday. has there been any talk about i know we only have x amount of vaccines, and i know we keep getting more each week. i know astrazeneca, which full disclosure, i am on the trial. i know they are looking at getting into the mix maybe in february, maybe in march. i think johnson & johnson is pretty close. i know other vaccines are around the corner. has there been any talk trying to move people up in the age range,in the at-risk age general population versus the very subcategories of essential workers? i know we've seen plenty of social media from state, local elected officials getting their shots. it's well-meaning. some of it is a little bragadocius. i know we have people in the age range if they get it, as alluded to in this briefing, unless you get the antibodies and get the various cocktails, you know, you don't stand a very good chance right now. i think even dr. marsh sort of alluded, we're getting to that population but i know some states are also pushing that population further to the top of the list of vaccine priorities. so is that something we've talked about, is that something we're thinking about doing? we're moving quickly so maybe we'll get there quickly regardless. but if someone could answer that for me, please. thank you. governor justice: steve, lots of people on the call can answer that, certainly general hoyer. let me just make a run at it, you know, from 80,000 feet and here's all there is to it. when dr. birx came here, you know, she was amazed with how focused we were on age, age, age. she was dead level focused on age, age, age. absolutely, without any question, we got to be able to keep the continuity of government going. we have to keep, you know, our hospitals open. we got to keep our acute care people going. our first responders. all of that network, we got to keep going because if not we'll fall down in lots of different areas. ok. from the standpoint of getting this vaccine more and more and more directly to the general public, to the elderly, it is the number one thing that we're trying to do. the number one thing. and general hoyer can speak about it, but my gracious sakes a living, we're working that and working that as diligently as we possibly can to be able to achieve just that. the other thing is just this. you know, when i came out and i mid-march, wey by will be way, way down the trail do you remember that? i mean, that's exactly what i said. people said, oh, that will never happen. no way. it will be toward the end of the summer and all this kind of stuff. hopefully, again, hopefully by mid-march we will be way, way down the trail. general hoyer, if you can step in and say a couple words. i think that pretty well describes it. general hoyer yes, sir, govern. you are correct. we are focused. if you look at the phases and you look particularly at phase what we've done is taken the four priorities that the governor gave us, plus the overarching strategic focus of age and we're basically balancing. so, first, focus is on age as related to that most vulnerable population in those congregate settings in nursing homes. we hope to have that complete maybe as early as today. and then as we started into maintaining those services that are needed to keep our state open, we focus initially on that age -- over age 50 population. initially over age 60. and then we spent, as we told you, these two weeks of building the infrastructure that we still need with our regional clinics, our health care facilities to be able to go after that age population across the general spectrum of west virginia. so as the governor pointed out, we are focused on age as a top priority because we know from the state's data that both our deaths and our hospitalizations, if we can address those age populations, we will have a significant impact. thank you. >> all right. thank you. next. >> good afternoon, governor, good afternoon, panel. a few weeks ago i got an email virginia, gton, west touting vitamin d as a good thing to do if you're trying to avoid the worst of coronavirus, a lot of the patients who died from coronavirus had a vitamin d deficiency. dr. fauci came out and said good things about vitamin d. i want to hear from the panel here if we need to drink more milk or adding vitamin d to our supplement list until we get the vaccine more thoroughly through virginia.of west governor justice: it's out of my pay grade, docs. it's up to y'all. one.ke this dr. amjad: all right, paul. that's a good question. that's a very common vitamin that a lot of the physicians are giving across the spectrum, i guess. there's no clear data that's been written about it. but i think what's been happening is a lot of the people that have been passing away from ovid-19 had been vitamin d deficient. it's an older population that's been passing away, especially in our nursing home population. we get vitamin d from our diet as well as the sun. i got a call touting that vitamin d is the thing to do if you're trying to avoid the worst of coronavirus, a lot of the patients who died from coronavirus had a vitamin d deficiency. dr. fauci came out and said good things about vitamin d. i want to hear from the panel here if we need to drink more milk and get vitamin d as we try to get the vaccine across the state of west virginia. governor justice: it's out of my pay grade, docs. >> take this one. dr. amjad: all right, paul. that's a good question. that's a very common vitamin that a lot of the physicians are giving across the spectrum, i guess. there's no clear data that's been written about it. but i think what's been happening is a lot of the people that have been passing away from covid19 had been vitamin d deficient. it's an older population that's been passing away, especially in our nursing home population. we get vitamin d from our diet as well as the sun. i think that's why you may see that as a recommendation to take a vitamin d. it's also a mineral that can be used in our body for different things. as far as i am aware, there's no clearcut evidence that vitamin d is protective for covid19. so that's as far as, you know, my knowledge for that goes. i don't know if clay has read anything different. that's for the vitamin d goes. you can overtake vitamins, too. you need to be cautious. i need to mention that vitamin d can cause kidney stones and other issues. we don't want people to go out there popping vitamin d unnecessarily as well. clay, do you have anything to add about vitamin d and ovid19? dr. marsh: no. paul, i think ayne is correct. having low levels of vitamin d doesn't mean that's what's predisposing you of having severe outcome issues with covid. and there's no data, to my knowledge, that says that taking vitamin d protects you against the severity of covid. you should consult with your physician because low vitamin d levels can cause calcium levels. there are benefits of taking vitamin d. i don't think there's any real reason to recommend people to augment their vitamin d other than getting out into the sun is healthy and drinking milk or whatever you like to keep the levels up. other than that, i would use the input of your physician. governor justice: paul, i said before, it's out of my pay grade. but my vitamin d levels is not real high, not real great. just for the docs' sake, i take a vitamin d tablet every day. so i i feel pretty good. so anyway, i'm an advocate. >> all right, thank you, paul. charles young with w.v. news. charles: for the last couple of press conferences, we talked about the antibody treatment, the treatments that the president and rudy giuliani received. what does it cost to receive that? is the state doing anything to ubsidize the cost of that? is that something that's available to the average person or is it restricted by cost? thank you. governor justice: secretary crouch, please do that, please, sir. secretary crouch: yes, thank you, governor. the antibody treatment is available throughout the state. we had a meeting call last week with the nursing home medical directors to make them aware of the ability to do this outside of the hospital. we're working with all of the longterm care facilities. this is a great approach to reducing deaths and reducing hospitalizations. there is that on this particular treatment and there's a lot of information that shows this is very helpful. early on, quickly as possible after a positive test, talk to your doctor. if it's a nursing home, they'll immediately talk to the medical director. as the governor said earlier, time is of the essence in these treatments. it's very important, very critical for folks to do this where appropriate to keep them out of the hospital. thank you. the cost to that, let me add sorry. there was a cost question. that antibody has been provided to us through the federal government, so there is no cost right now for the antibody itself. so that antibody treatment must be arranged through your physician. there may be other costs costs associated with that but not for the antibody itself. >> all right. thank you, charles. katie coin with the charleston azette mail. katie: hey, governor. i know we've gone over the phases a few times here in the last few days for testing and i know we've been pretty clear these aren't necessarily one after the other after the other. i'm wondering if you can clarify or secretary crouch, dr. amjad, someone on the panel. when we talk about bringing vaccines into corrections facilities, we've only really talked so far about staffers. you know, we're seeing more outbreaks or cases, at least, come up in these facilities. at least with the holiday in the last week, it seems testing has not been as frequent as before. when can we see vaccines get into our corrections facilities? when should that be completed as well, knowing what we do about spread in these places? thank you. governor justice: i'm going to defer to general hoyer in just one second. let me just say this, too. you know, as far as the successes in our corrections facilities, they've been phenomenal. i think we lost four or five people in corrections all across the board. it is unbelievable how successful we have been to date. so, you know, general, you go from there and everything. but we surely are factoring in all the things that we're doing. general hoyer: yes, sir, governor. katie, you're correct. we don't have vaccines in number to vaccinate the inmate population. so what we focused in is knowing from the dhhr epidemiology data that the bulk of the spread in those types of facilities come from the staff, getting them in a community setting and then bringing them into the facility. so we will be focusing on the staff piece. obviously, as we talked about in the previous discussion a minute ago, we got to focus on our age aged population in the state, because we know from the epidemiology data that we got to get to that population because they represent the most significant amount of our hospitalizations as well as most significant amount of our eaths. thank you. >> all right. thank you, katie. governor, i'll turn it back over to you. governor justice: well, i don't really have many notes today. you know, again, i'm tickled to death with how we've been able to get the vaccine out to our longterm care facilities. especially, you know, nursing homes and assisted living because that's where half of the deaths are occurring. from the standpoint of i am really encouraged on how many doses are coming into west virginia, and i'm encouraged on how fast we will be able to get this to people, you know, that are out there that are, you know, of our aged population, our general population, and how fast we'll be able to hopefully be able to getting that to them. you know, one thing i want to say, before i go any further, a fella that's been the leader of the band with our nursing homes and just been suffering through the covid situation himself is larry pack and i think larry is oing better. i know it's been a tough go of it. i tried to call him and everything. he was probably having a tough go when i was trying to go. nevertheless, larry, i'm glad you're doing better. what a great man. i know he's a delegatetobe. i wish larry the best. i guess i just close by just saying this. just, please, please, 1,263 great west virginians we've lost. their families really do hear our prayers. and so join kathy and i in that prayer always for all those, but in addition to that, there is a young family, there's a family of loved ones, mom and dad, you know, and i can't recall, maybe a brother and a sister, but nevertheless, a mom and a dad and a fiance and little baby to be, a great man, a hero in our country, logan oung, we lost. please remember them, too. and so that's really all i have today. let's not only remember them, let's don't ever, ever let them feel alone. so we're going to get through this, west virginia. you just keep battling, hanging in there, and whatever you do, for god sake's a living, don't let someone tell you some hocus pocus hunk of junk that you will grow another arm or antlers. for crying out loud, you got to take the vaccine, west virginia, because it will really save your life. thank you so much. cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. >> the house in recess, expected to return at 4:00 p.m. astern time. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2020] >> when the house returns, watch live coverage right here on c-span. that from majority leh mcconnell yesterday. we want to get your thoughts on that. joining us on the phone this morning to give us more details is natalie andrews, congressional reporter with the wall street journal. what will happen today in the house? natalie: good morning. we will see the house vote on cash package to increase checks to americans.

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