Although there are reasons to see hope and a lot of examples of people helping one another, all of which should lift us up. There are also circumstances that may cause you to feel despair. To find yourself swimming in the stress and uncertainty of it all.
First I want to say to all of you feel all of it. We are living in a deeply unprecedented moment and holding the emotional ramifications of that inside will only be harder on you. It’s okay to feel. And please know that you don’t have to feel it all alone.
I want you to know that we’re here to help. And here’s how
The Illinois Department of Human Services Mental Health Division has launched a free of charge, emotional support text line for Illinois experiencing stress related to COVID-19. Call for calm.
This isn’t a crisis hotline, but a source of support. Once a resident texts, the hotline. They receive a call from a caring counselor from a local community mental health center. Let them be a listening ear for the challenges that you are experiencing.
If you would like to speak with a mental health professional, you can text talk to 552020.
As always, please pardon all transcription errors.
Today I’m announcing a remote patient monitoring program specifically to serve those potentially infected with COVID-19 will be able to recover from the safety of their homes. Through this program health workers will digitally connect with you when you’re experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, but do not require an emergency or inpatient care.
Patients will receive daily virtual visits and receive wellness kits that include things like thermometers and oximeters blood pressure cuffs and alcohol wipes. This program serves to reduce barriers to physical health and mental health services in all communities and income levels, especially underserved communities, and those most at risk. During this pandemic. And because patients are served in their home. This program will also help limit the spread of the virus and safeguard hospitals from being overwhelmed by keeping those who can recover at home, staying at home.
* Virtual town hall for kids…
It’s important that we engage our children in these discussions and make sure that they know we’re thinking about them constantly. To begin to address this, I’m co-hosting a special event today with Lurie Children’s Hospital for children’s childhood resilience. The Illinois children’s mental health partnership and mikvah challenge at 5pm today I will be hosting a virtual town hall meeting for kids of all ages. It’s being hosted on Facebook Live at the Lurie children’s hospital’s Facebook page. I’ll repost the link on my Twitter and Facebook pages to help guide people to the site. I hope that kids from all across Illinois, will join us there.
Pritzker said he will hold a brief press conference tomorrow and Dr. Ezike will not be attending so she can have some time off with her family.
* Dr. Ezike…
Let me be clear, if there are churches that were planning to convene tomorrow, please cancel now. We can’t risk spreading the virus through this church congregation. We do have evidence of people who got sick through attending church, and other similar gatherings. Let’s not do that. […]
We have to stay the course. There’s no doubt that we will get through this pandemic, but it is a long marathon. We can’t grow tired of washing our hands. Despite the cabin fever, we still need to stay at home. We still have a long road ahead, and we must endure with patience until we get to the other side.
* On to questions for the governor. Do you know how many of these cases are requiring hospital care and do you see the curve flattening at all? [The governor and Dr. Ezike have been saying just this for days, by the way, so another weekend reporter asks another repetitive question. I really do not like these weekend pressers for that very reason.]…
So I will tell you a few things to watch in the numbers, and we’ll be talking about the hospitalization numbers and the ICU numbers again as we have each week.
But what we’re seeing is a flattening of the curve and what that means is a lower rise in hospitalizations than was originally anticipated. That’s a really good sign. Hospitalizations, ICU bed use and ventilators, are the most real way you can track the way that the the virus is moving, and what effect it’s having on our communities and whether it’s increasing exponentially arithmetically or otherwise. And what we’re seeing is a flattening of that same thing, when you talk about cases, and the death toll is these numbers will bounce around each day, and you’ve seen you know we’ve had higher numbers than we had today in previous days we’ve had lower numbers. But if you look at a kind of a moving average of days. You can see that the, the rate of ascent has significantly diminished. Again, it’s not flat, exactly. But, it’s not going up the way that it was before. So we’re pleased by that but but by no means do we think that that is determinative of what tomorrow will bring or the next week we’ll bring again as we look at other models of variety of models you can see different peaks and different moments in which we need to bring more or less resources to bear.
* Yet another question about when it will end. Short answer: Nobody knows yet.
* You mentioned earlier this week that you were looking at a third party vendor to help with the IDS website in order to help people get benefits faster and smoother. Has there been a vendor selected, are they Chicago or Illinois based and when will they start?…
Yes, yes, and they have already begun.
There are several things going on and when we talk about an IDES vendor, there are two things that we’re adjusting for, one is the massive numbers of people who are applying for unemployment in the traditional system. I mean, we’re talking about multiples of what has ever been applied for an IDES and so that’s something that the system just wasn’t ready to handle. And that’s why we brought in outside help, we did that, you know, very soon after it was clear that we were getting overwhelmed.
And we have more people answering phones and we have more people who are kind of keeping the system running. It has challenges, this is a 10 year old system that works fine if you have a normal number, normal range of applications on any given day. But when you have days when 100,000 people are trying to access the system makes it more difficult. So we brought in outside help, that’s one thing.
The other thing is this new program of unemployment for independent contractors, that’s something that never existed before and the federal government provided resources for that. Not for the building of the system necessarily, but for the independent contractors. We need to put that system up and in place, no state had anything like it because it didn’t exist ever before. We’re now building that system, again, with an outside vendor building it. We have a terrific team at our own department of innovation technology that’s working alongside them and making sure that as they stand it up that it will work properly for people here in Illinois.
* Satisfied with number of people wearing masks? [Most people at the podium are not wearing masks, by the way, and I have a question submitted about that]…
As I came out of my own home this morning, there were people walking along the street, I would say two thirds of the people that I saw were wearing a mask or a bandana or a scarf. And the other third we’re not, I want to encourage everybody to do so.
Pritzker, of course, lives in a very upscale neighborhood.
* What is the latest with PPE needs, ventilator needs, is the state caught up?…
Every day I asked the question you know if we have an unused something out there. Why is it unused and you know, when do we need, you know, do we need fewer of them or do we need more because the peak might be higher than we expect on the subject of PPE. Let me just say that we are going to continue to need more, even at the hospitals and everybody is being supplied properly for a roughly a seven to 10 day period, at a minimum for each hospital, and then behind them backing them up are their local county public health departments, which we’re supplying also so we’re supplying directly to hospitals, and we’re supplying the public health departments who can also give to the hospitals what they need, not to mention all the other institutions that may need them. And the first responders so we’re the backup system for everybody we’re also the direct deliver to many of them.
And I would say we’re in constant need we’re trying to acquire millions of pieces of PPE gowns and goggles and masks and everything else. And we’re going to continue to need that, but the flow seems to be coming. I can never say an adequate pace because I won’t feel like it’s adequate until we’re, you know we have big stores of it to back everybody up.
On the subject of ventilators, we have looked across all of our hospitals and in nearly every hospital, there is there is ventilator availability and certainly in every region. So if there ever is a hospital that might run out and use their last ventilator. There are ventilators within that region we watch that closely so that we might be able to move those ventilators around or the patients. So, we’re out in the market trying to acquire more ventilators, we don’t know exactly what we need what we know is that the range of models tend to tell us what to indicate to us that we don’t want to be wrong. And I’d rather have too many than too few I’d rather be wrong in that way. At the end, and just say, you know, we overestimated and we saved a lot of lives.
* The Pekin Country Club decided to open their golf course to members and many residents are concerned. Should they be shut down like golf courses across the state?…
Yeah, I would suggest that this is not a time to loosen up the standards that you’ve set under this COVID-19 crisis that we are just beginning to bend the curve here. This is a good sign. But this is not an indication that we should be letting up on those standards. We want to make sure that everybody is abiding by the stay at home rules that they’re in fact continuing even more so strenuously to follow the advice that’s being given by the CDC as suggested a mask for example, and not gathering in public places in in groups. So I would discourage people from using a golf course or from opening a golf course.
* With this new at home monitoring program will IDPH be able to report the recovery rate, what’s the best current estimate for the number of Illinois who have recovered from COVID…
Dr. Ezike: We did put out two different surveys, asking people to give if they were recovered seven days after their positive test, and then the first, first time that we sent out the survey I think we had a 48% recovered rate seven days post a positive test, and the second time we ran it it was 43 for the next reiteration which will we can do next week we’re going to extend it to have it 14 days after the positive test and we’ll be happy to extend and share that information as well.
* In Kentucky the governor ordered law enforcement to scan license plates of cars in church parking lots. In California, local authorities are allowing driving services,. Should churches in Illinois meet and driving parking lot style services?…
They should not. We’re recommending against that and I would suggest that this is just one holiday, it’s one time it’s one year, when I would ask people to do something that I know is unusual and uncommon for them, but it’s to please stay at home to if you’re going to attend services please attend them virtually online even telephonically, it’s much safer for you and just as importantly, it’s safer for the other parishioners for your neighbors your friends for your entire community.
* Shouldn’t everyone at the podium be wearing masks when they’re not speaking? [Only one person is wearing a mask]…
Thank you for asking that. We are all trying to be very careful to stay distant from one another. And it is not untrue that when you’re gathering in a group of people that everybody might want to wear a mask. It’s not a requirement, but I appreciate your pointing it out. I wear a mask coming from my office all the way here. As I’m leaving I put on my mask. I think all of us are doing the same. We want to protect each other in that regard. And so, I think it’s an excellent point and I just say it’s maybe an example to everybody else, or a point to make to everybody else that masks are a good idea wherever you may be among a group of people.
* Has the state purchased or received antibody tests? If so, how many is it administering? Are they being distributed to local health departments, and how soon until these tests will be widespread throughout the state to determine who has contracted the virus?…
Dr. Ezike: Thank you so, so again, to be clear, the current test that we’re using is to identify who has the virus now. But as we get, hopefully close to the peak and the plateau and hopefully start coming down off this curve. We have to be able to understand when we will be able to lessen some of the restrictions again.
Let’s be clear if we don’t know who is immune and we just open up the doors and we all head out that virus is still out there. And the people who have not contracted will still be at risk of contracting it, getting complications and dying. And so all that will happen is that we will have delayed people’s illness and complications and death. And so the idea is that we want to be able to identify what percentage of people in the community have actually had the infection maybe didn’t have a positive tests weren’t formally diagnosed, but have actually had the infection maybe they had mild symptoms to almost no symptoms and so it wasn’t recognized, but however have developed the antibodies which we think would be protective, and we think that when, when the person would not get the infection again.
And so, we are working on a very robust program we’ve, we’re working with some consultants and some university partners to try to get the antibody tests, and many are coming online we have one that’s approved now and then we’re waiting for additional tests have come online, because we are going to have to get hundreds of thousands, millions of tests in the state and have a very robust way to calculate and identify all the people that are tested so that we can identify the percentage of people in the state in various communities right from county to county community to community, what is the percentage of people who have been exposed to get at what would be as 10, essentially like the herd immunity. And so trying to figure out what percentage of people would need to have been exposed and have these antibodies and figure out if enough. If the communities actually have that requisite level of herd immunity, that, that is the important data that we need to collect in order to identify when we can start releasing restrictions and make sure that we’re not opening up the state, just to get further infection.
* The President said yesterday that he has to make a big decision about opening up the country. But isn’t that up to Governors?…
It is up to Governors. These are executive orders that have been put in place by governors, but it’s also maybe more importantly, up to the healthcare community and the scientists who advise us what the right thing to do is, and as Dr Ezike said it’s very important to recognize that if you just literally flung the doors open and said okay everybody head outside everything’s fine now, we would, what do you know head into exactly the kind of peeking that we’re, you know that had once more to a higher peak of people who are contracting COVID-19. So it’s very important for us to maintain, for the moment, the stay at home order to make sure that people are following it, that people are wearing masks, that they’re washing their hands doing all of these things for a period of time going forward, so that we can make sure that we’re coming down off of that peak.
And then this is the point about the prior question that I would like to reiterate, which is we do need to test for antibodies, because that’s part of the other side of this when we’re able to see a larger number of people who’ve had it and recovered who have antibodies will begin to end when you’ve got treatment, and you’ve got contact tracing along with testing on the front end. Those three three things, test, trace and treat, when we’ve got all three of those things going, that is the moment that we can begin to start to open things up.
And another question was asked about when and how the order will end. You can guess the answer since he’s said it a kabillion times already.
* The governor will be speaking on this topic today…
Today, Governor JB Pritzker released a new All In Illinois PSA video featuring a strong message directed at African American communities across Chicago and Illinois, as a reminder that no community is immune to COVID-19.
Current data from Illinois and Chicago public health officials show:
• African Americans make up nearly 30% of the state’s confirmed COVID-19 cases and 42% of deaths.
• In Chicago, 72% of deaths due to COVID-19 were black, despite African Americans making up roughly 30% of the city’s population.
• People with pre-existing health conditions are more likely to have worse outcomes if they get COVID-19. Some of those conditions include: diabetes, hypertension, cardiac disease or heart disease — all common for black families.
Governor Pritzker will address the challenges facing African American communities during his daily briefing today at 2:30pm.
This new PSA message, featuring prominent African American celebrities, urges everyone to stay at home to protect those who are most at risk and those on the front lines who must work and cannot stay home. “Staying inside truly saves lives,” said Jackie Joyner-Kersee. The message is simple: if we are “All In” for each other and “All In” for Illinois, we will get through this and flatten the curve together.
The new PSA video features the following celebrities:
• Artist, Chance the Rapper
• Former Chicago Bears player, Charles “Peanut” Tillman
• Chicago artist, Theaster Gates
• Olympian, Jackie Joyner-Kersee
• Actor/comedian, Deon Cole
The data accumulating over the last few weeks has shined a bright light on what seems like a uniquely American problem. Many could have told you what it would highlight, long before the data drew the picture. Generations of systemic disadvantages in healthcare delivery and in healthcare access in communities of color and black communities in particular are now amplified in this crisis. In the city of Chicago, suburban Cook County in greater St Louis in cities and towns all across our state and our nation.
First we need more ubiquitous testing. We’re working hard to expand our state testing capacity and as we do so we’re thinking seriously about where and how these tests are available and to whom. To that end, my team and I have worked to set up a partnership between the downtown Lurie Children’s Hospital in the city of Chicago, and for federally qualified health centers on the city’s south and west sides.
As always, please pardon any transcription errors. Thanks.
* The governor listed several city and suburban sites where tests would be done and then said…
These centers will take specimens for 400 people per day, and send them [out] for testing. And in the Metro East region, we’re launching a similar operation, starting next week three locations of the Southern Illinois Healthcare Foundation system will be taking 470 specimens per day and sending them to Anderson Hospital in Madison County. […]
I’m also excited to announce that our new state run South Suburban drive thru testing center will open early next week in the Markham Harvey area. We’ll be taking hundreds of specimens per day with test results coming back to patients much faster than the federally contracted labs.
* A bit of news here since federal help was supposed to end this week…
As for our existing two state drive thru sites, we’ve secured an extension of our federal contracts while we work to transition these sites to run entirely through state and local labs for faster test results.
* Hotel rooms…
As part of our early crisis preparations, we required each of our local jurisdictions to come up with an alternate housing plan to help residents quarantine in a safe place. Simultaneously we at the state level began preparing up to 2000 hotel rooms, outside of Chicago, to support suburban and downstate communities.
These hotel rooms are for people who tested positive for the virus, but have low level symptoms and don’t need hospital level care. There are other rooms available for people who were exposed to a COVID-19 positive person. And are there for a person under investigation, who may need to move out of their home as a precautionary measure to make sure that they don’t expose their families, or their roommates. This extends to our first responder communities especially local health departments.
* Community health providers…
This week 45 community health centers across Illinois are receiving more than $51 million through the bipartisan federal CARES act to sustain their response to this virus.
* Abbott Labs…
I also want to provide an update on our Abbott rapid test distribution. As I mentioned on Wednesday, Illinois received 15 rapid test machines, while we’re still working to acquire the necessary materials to scale up their use beyond the 120 federally provided tests, we are deploying these machines in the following manner so that they’re ready to go as soon as the new tests come. Seven of these machines are going to the federally qualified health centers that I mentioned earlier, to Chicago’s south and west sides, and the remaining three to East St. Louis and the surrounding region.
Another three will go to the Illinois Department of Human Services facilities, the Ludeman Development Center in park forest. The Shapiro Developmental Center in Kankakee, and the Elgin mental health center. And the final five will go to the Illinois Department of Corrections facilities Stateville, Logan, Graham, Dixon and Menard.
* New guidance…
Today we issued guidance that vulnerable and historically marginalized communities must receive equitable care, so that no person of color, or person with disabilities, suffers a disparate outcome due to a legacy of discrimination. It’s in moments like these that we owe each other even greater expressions of humanity.
* Dr. Ezike…
As the governor mentioned, the state is working on alternative housing in communities of color to address some of these challenges of people who live in close communities, and who may be at risk or who’ve already been found to be positive. At IDPH we’ve also created the COVID-19 equity team. It’s comprised of our director for the Center of Minority Health, and it involves other state agencies as well as many community organizations that will serve as the voice and the informational hub on how to accurately address health disparities.
* Dr. Ezike…
Overall mortality rates among blacks are five times higher than whites. And when you break it down by age groups, the disparities are even higher. For people in their 50s, the mortality rate is 12 times higher for blacks than their white counterparts. For people in their 60s, the rate is eight times higher for blacks than their white counterparts. For people in their 70s, it’s 10 times.
The governor has also invited several African-American community leaders to speak. They all offered praise for the governor and encouraged people to stay home and observe social distancing and see a doctor before they have to go to the emergency rooms.
* On to questions for the governor. You mentioned the need for widespread testing. Is 10,000 the number you’ve been throwing out, is that enough or we’re talking about even greater amounts of testing and should the president invoke defense production act as far as testing is concerned?…
Well I’ve been saying for some time now that the president should be invoking the defense production act for everything that we need to combat this pandemic. This is a war it’s a war against COVID-19. If there’s ever a time when you need to organize our industries in the country to address this with PP with testing supplies with machines. These are all things that we need to accomplish the goals that we need to make, you know, a priority in this
* Just to follow up on your comments yesterday regarding summer gatherings perhaps needing to be looked at and possibly canceled, by that same logic is it inevitable you’re going to have to cancel on site schooling for the rest of the year?…
Yesterday I was trying to address the question of whether people should be thinking about what to do about their festivals over the summer and. And I was merely suggesting that people should contemplate, what if, because we need to follow what the scientists and the doctors tell us. That’s the most important thing that we’ve got to save as many lives as possible. And so that’s going to help dictate what the answers to the questions are, it’s not what I’m saying at the podium. On any given day it’s really about what the best scientists that we’ve got are telling us how we ought to operate going forward, because this is all about saving lives. That is what this is all about.
So I’m going to follow that advice and to your question it follows that the question about schools will be dictated again by where are we as we approach April 30, which is the end of our current stay at home order, and what progress has been made and what are the doctors saying about, could you congregate groups of people together in the sizes that classrooms tend to be in the size of. So again I’m gonna wait, and listen to as we make progress here. and you’ve heard me say yesterday, we’re making progress, so that’s good news. But I don’t want to project what next week or the week after will exactly look like because I don’t exactly know when we’re going to peak, or how fast the downslide will be if we do come down off of that peak, or if peaking means that we’re simply flattening the curve and flattening the curve and staying at the peak for some period of time, and then falling we just don’t know yet.
They keep answering the question even though the answer never changes.
* The President today said that the governors, and he didn’t name any by name, but he said that the governors are more satisfied now … are you satisfied with where things are in terms of PPE and everything right now?…
I won’t be satisfied until we’re past this pandemic, frankly, so you know if you hear me complain now and again if you hear me argue for more for Illinois. It’s because we need it. And it’s because we’re doing everything that we can, and it’s not enough, and therefore we need help from others. And so I’m going to make that plea, wherever I need to. But, you know, we’re doing everything we can, I feel like we are making progress, but I’m going to be on the phone with the governors and with the vice president with the president for as long and as often as I need to be.
* I don’t know if you were made aware earlier in the day but since we’ve been in this room. The Chicago Police Department announced that they’ve lost their second member to COVID-19. So first of all your reaction to that, and part two of that is there are still first responders on the first line both in Chicago Chicago Police Department and other departments who still claim they are being protected not enough is being done to keep them safe with regard to PPE…
Let me address the loss of another member of our law enforcement. This has happened across the state. Our first responders. They’re the ones protecting us they in our health care workers. And so every loss of life is a loss to all of us. But someone who’s out there every day who, you know, as they leave their home and kiss their families goodbye knows that they’re exposing themselves potentially to people who have COVID-19 and doing so to protect all of us. Those people are worthy of some special note. Those are heroes and so I you know I every loss is important to all of us we’re paying attention to every loss. But again, those heroes are special and should be taken note of each time so I’m glad you raised it to my attention. Thank you.
We are providing PPE to law enforcement all across the state we have state police that are coordinating the provision of PPE to police departments, fire departments other first responders. Remember that the state is really the backup and support, you know we’ll deliver. I mean if a police department doesn’t have what it needs, they simply need to reach out to the state police or to IEMA, the Emergency Management Agency for Illinois, and we will make sure that they get what they need. And we are constantly out in the global market acquiring the PPE that’s necessary we have it today so anybody that says that they don’t have it, or they aren’t being given the PPE, first thing they should do is go to their superiors at their own agency at their police department or fire department and ask them for that PPE, and if they’re not getting it there they can call their local health department which is where we often deliver much of the PPE that we’re sending around the state, or to the state police and we will make sure that PPE is provided to their department.
* Here in Chicago, and our region hospital CEO was worried about nursing and medical staff leaving their posts for other jobs at McCormick Place and other alternative medical care facilities, he says they just can’t compete with the wages that are offered at McCormick and is worried that they’re going to end up with a critical shortage of staff to operate…
So, I want to make clear what’s happening so nationally, there is a shortage of healthcare workers, and they are looking everywhere in New York City and New Jersey and Connecticut and all the states that you’ve heard of that are hotspots, including by the way in Michigan right they’re hiring wherever they can find people, and there is a market for those people. And so they’re being bid up, essentially, so that the competition is coming from all over the country again. This is because there is no organization of, you know, the supply chain even a people here which the President could be helpful with. But, this is where we are. And so, it is true that the the alternate care facilities in Illinois are also in that market, but we are not hiring, we are not hiring or making, we’re not making any effort to reach out to people in the Chicago market within a certain radius of Chicago, because we don’t want to take away from existing facilities in order to have them work at one of our alternate care facilities. That doesn’t mean though that someone who is part time and not assigned to any given hospital, and therefore isn’t on staff doesn’t put themselves in the market for one of these other positions either in another state or in an alternate care facility so we’re trying to be careful to not, you know, try to poach anybody from an existing facility. And we want to make sure that everybody’s fully staffed.
* You’ve made it clear that you don’t necessarily agree with some of the peak projections that are circulating. So in the interest of transparency, can you share your own methods and models for calculations and peak?…
Well we have multiple models i mean i it would be hard for me just to point at one particular thing and here’s the thing, even any model that everybody likes to point at the IHME model. And, and, you know, it’s a fine model, but the range of possibility between you know the low end of the high end, we’re talking about, you know, I think 30,000 beds difference between the low end and the high end of that model. So I you know how do you even build for that range?
So you have to, you know, you have to kind of look at several models look at what their assumptions are talk to our own experts we’ve got some of the best in the, in the world right here in Illinois, that we rely upon to listen to how they look at those models and also their own models, and then you know you’re, you’re basically taking several models and trying to guesstimate where is the right spot to aim for. And then the question that I think everybody should be thinking about which is. It’s not just about the peak that we’re potentially going through over the next several weeks. There’s also the threat of a peak in the fall.
And you know doctors will tell you that if you look back at the Spanish flu and other pandemics, and even if you look in other countries that have opened up after they’ve peaked that you see a resurgence of cases because we don’t have a vaccine yet. And there isn’t a treatment either yet. So, if you really begin to open things up you’re going to have a second wave. And so we need to make sure that we’re fully prepared. We don’t want to have a second wave, and God forbid we do, because other places in the country open up or because you know we make adjustments and they aren’t proper, which I hope we don’t do improper ones that is that we have to be able to address that. So, so all of the acquisition of PPE and and ventilators, and the maintenance of ICU beds and hospitals has that in mind and again we look at multiple models in order to try and guesstimate and that’s really the best you can do what you really need.
* A community health center in Jacksonville laid off staff and closed doors today because it has too few patients coming in. What are those medical staff needed and other hotspots and what is your plan to keep these medical centers open?…
Well there’s certainly no intention to hire them away from an existing health center. But certainly any of the folks who were working at a health center that are no longer working there, because that center is closed, we need them elsewhere, we need them at another facility. […]
And I’m surprised to learn of that closing there is money that’s coming in I think I just announced it moments ago that’s going to help centers, maybe it’s not enough and I would argue that the hospitals and health centers in the country are not getting enough yet from the federal relief packages. So I’m lobbying and arguing for more. But, I am sorry that that a health center anywhere in the state has closed.
* The Vice President urged people this morning to keep Easter gatherings to fewer than 10 people. Is that something you would agree with or would you tell people to limit a holiday gathering to just those in their own households?…
Well, I would like people to stay at home. I mean that is the safest best thing that they can do stay home. Celebrate at home, you can do so over telecommunications over video conferencing. Zoom or Skype or some other method and and many, many of the pastor’s that are here will acknowledge, everybody would like to get together for the holidays. But this is just one holiday where, you know, I think the the you know the teachings from the Bible will tell you that you know that it is our obligation to save a life. If we have the opportunity to staying home is saving a life, not just your own somebody else’s.
* The New York Times obtained a homeland security projection showing infections might spike in mid to late summer if stay at home orders are lifted after 30 days. Are you familiar with these projections and when will you decide whether to extend it…
I just read a brief paragraph about it, maybe an hour or two ago.
And then he said what he’s been saying for days and days when these questions are asked. He’ll listen to the scientists before making up his mind.
* The data appears to indicate that the coronavirus case growth rate is slowing and Illinois is bending the curve, but the number of new cases today was higher than yesterday. Can you comment on the prospects for bending the curve down, as well as what’s expected next in terms of next steps needed to bend it down further?…
I said yesterday that I believe when you look at the data, it appears to me that we are bending the curve. As far as bending the curve down that evidence isn’t quite there yet. But bending it downward to show it has a downward slope we aren’t there yet. But remember that we were increasing the number of deaths and increasing the number of cases in an exponential fashion for a little while […]
I think you would see also that the number of cases that are being detected as we have increasing testing, and you saw today that we were again over 6000 I think even over 6500, that we had nevertheless around the level number of cases detected. So again I’m not a doctor, I’m not a statistician but I can read numbers and understand what leveling looks like and, Again, a few days in a row is a good sign and a glimmer of hope.
* More than two thirds of rural counties across the country have a confirmed case and at least one case of a COVID-19 death, and one in 10 are reporting at least one death, what can you do to make sure Illinois rural areas are getting the testing they deserve…
You heard me talk about the fact that in downstate Illinois we in fact are increasing testing. I talked about the Metro East area but you know Carbondale and Edwardsville both we monitor very closely and the health centers that are in the critical access hospitals health centers that are in other communities in downstate Illinois are receiving funding, they’re receiving testing, they have swabs many of them have the ability to send the testing to our state labs, we have a state lab that’s in Carbondale one in Springfield so we have the ability to collect those swabs and test them and in relatively short order. And we want to make sure that everybody has testing available. That is why we must increase testing everywhere. It isn’t just in Chicago.
* When will Westlake hospital be up and running to respond to COVID-19 patients, what about other shuttered hospitals the state has identified for opening again, if they’re not up and running by the time Illinois hits our peak will they only be open as long as money in the cares act can pay for them…
It’s difficult to pinpoint an exact date that they will be open but what I can tell you is that our target date for Westlake hospital Metro south, as well as Sherman hospital is April 24 for completion of construction. Once construction is complete, we will need about two days to train all of the staff and have the facility ready to open and accept patients for vibra Hospital, we have a little bit more of an extended timeline we are targeting may 9 for construction completion at Vibra.
* How has the pandemic changed how your family celebrated Passover this year? Do you have any advice or recommendations for family celebrating Easter this weekend?…
Well I was a part of two different saders on both nights of Passover. And they were both over zoom […]
So there are lots of ways to do it. I will say that it was almost fun. … Because you can connect with people that that might not otherwise be able to get to your home on a typical Passover, or a typical Easter and this is an opportunity for you to experience this all the same together. And it really is like being, I know it doesn’t sound like it, but it really is kind of like being in the same room you can see everybody. If anybody ever saw the old show Hollywood Squares. It’s a little bit like Hollywood Squares, you can see everybody on the same screen and talk to them all and it’s really quite good so my staff are all about half my age are laughing in the background because they don’t know what Hollywood Squares. So anyway, thank you all very much. Happy Easter everyone.
Two people have died and more than 50 have tested positive for the coronavirus at the Elisabeth Ludeman Center, an enormous state-run facility for adults with severe disabilities in Park Forest that’s become a virus “hot spot” in the south suburbs.
The majority of cases are residents who live at the facility, but more than a dozen staff members have been infected, Park Forest Mayor Jonathan Vanderbilt said Friday. […]
Vanderbilt is imploring the public to donate personal protective gear to the facility.
It is most in need of disposable stethoscopes, disposable blood pressure cuffs and disposable gowns. Vanderbilt said he reached out to the Cubs and White Sox asking for the teams’ rain ponchos, which could double as protective gowns for staff at the facility.
“The staff is desperate for this protective gear,” Vanderbilt said. “Many of the residents have underlying health issues, and the number of infections at the facility is expected to rise, that’s the scary part.”
* In the wake of news about outbreaks in at least three different state facilities which serve developmentally disabled people, Hannah Meisel at the Daily Line asked the governor and the IDPH director yesterday what the state is doing about it. The answers were somewhat unclear, so I reached out to the governor’s office for a better explanation…
IDPH has worked closely with IDHS to ensure our congregate care facilities under the state’s care were prepared for COVID-19.
At the beginning of March, IDPH issued guidance for long-term care facilities. Facilities were instructed to think through plans to identify spaces to separate residents and spread out if they needed and create plans for isolation if they needed.
First, facilities implemented visitor questionnaires and screening and then stopped visitors altogether to try to prevent the virus from entering the facility. Pre-shift assessments were implemented to ensure staff were not working while sick. When residents required healthcare they tried to provide appointments within the facility instead of transferring residents to a hospital. A lot of steps were taken before they had a positive case.
Now that there are cases at these facilities, IDPH is working closely with them in terms of having an infection control preventionist working directly with the facilities. We’re keeping a close eye, and we’ve had deliveries of thousands of PPE materials to these facilities, include a shipment that should have been delivered to Murray today.
It’s obviously not enough if we have a state facility begging baseball teams for rain ponchos.
* And there’s this from IARF President & CEO Josh Evans…
It is with deep sadness and concern that we continue to learn of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in group homes and state centers where individuals with intellectual/developmental disabilities reside. With at least 47 known cases in group homes and five deaths – and with news of over a dozen residents of Murray Center - we grieve with families and guardians that are experiencing loss and we hope for a speedy recovery for those going through this horrible illness. […]
Yet for many staff in IARF provider agencies and state-run centers, there isn’t access to critically needed personal protective equipment (PPEs), such as masks, disinfectant, thermometers, and robes. We simply cannot get PPE in the quantity we need it to protect residents and staff.
Evans went on to praise the Department of Human Services and the administration for taking quick action that likely saved lives, but then said this…
Consider this a call to anyone reading this – in government, outside of government, in supply chains, in our healthcare and social services safety net with any sort of surplus or reserve – we need PPE – we need it to protect our friends and loved ones with developmental disabilities, and the staff that support them – with families of their own.
The Illinois Department of Human Services has conducted hundreds of coronavirus tests at its seven facilities for people with developmental disabilities in the past week, yielding positive results for 112 residents and 43 employees.
The confirmed cases include 17 residents and six employees at Warren G. Murray Developmental Center in Centralia, the third-largest facility in the state with 241 residents and 559 employees. […]
At least 69 residents and employees have tested positive for coronavirus at Samuel H. Shapiro Developmental Center in Kankakee, the state’s largest facility for people with developmental disabilities. Elisabeth Ludeman Developmental Center in Park Forest, the second-largest, had 52 confirmed cases and two deaths as of Thursday.
Lindsay Ippel Douglass has worked in emergency rooms and Level 1 trauma centers as a nurse. She’s also worked in the intensive care unit at Decatur Memorial Hospital after she and husband Chris moved back from Chicago several years ago.
When the COVID-19 unit opened at the hospital, she volunteered to work there, too. One evening as she headed to work, her husband and two small children were outdoors, and her husband asked a passerby to help them cheer for her as she left.
“The next night my former basketball coach from Millikin, Lori Kerans, and her family as well as my in-laws who all live nearby joined them,” Douglass said. “Since then it has grown to not only include many neighbors but other family, friends, Millikin teammates and friends and other supporters from my church.”
The support for her and her fellow frontline healthcare workers helps keep their spirits up, she said, as well as donations of food and protective equipment such as masks, safety glasses and headbands.
* This was on Twitter a few days ago. Make sure to turn up the sound…
If the goal is to keep social distancing as a way to bend the virus curve, then the government is sending mixed messages.
On one hand, the government is shutting down small businesses who were following the social distancing rules and had smaller customer bases, while concurrently allowing big box stores to remain open, with the implication that bigger stores must be safer.
Here are a few examples of many mixed messages that do not seem to pass the public commonsense test:
A flower store on Perryville was informed that they could not sell flowers, not even curbside. The reasoning behind the decision; public safety was at risk. Yet on the very same street, Lowes, Home Depot and Meijer’s all have their flower departments fully open.
I think it’s a reasonable question. So I put it to the governor’s office by using the example of small clothing stores that are closed while big box stores stayed open and are selling clothes.
* Response from Jordan Abudayyeh…
COVID-19 has brought us unprecedented challenges that no one could have imagined just a few months ago.
Like the governor has said, there are no good or easy choices. Right now, there are only bad and less bad choices.
For many communities in Illinois, big box stores are the only pharmacy or grocery store in town. The administration prioritized keeping open essential businesses so residents would have access to food and medicine during this crisis.
Again, there are no perfect solutions. Once we’re able to test expansively, closely trace the virus, and offer treatment we look forward to returning to some semblance of normalcy.
Thoughts?
…Adding… Since I asked Jordan about clothing stores, she just sent me this about garden shops…
The Department of Commerce and Economic Development (DCEO)’s original guidance provided that “stores that sell supplies that assist with either (a) agriculture; or (b) products for landscaping can continue to sell those products to the public, provided adequate social distancing is complied with.” This guidance remains valid.
DCEO has expanded their original guidance so that all garden stores, garden centers, and nurseries (even those that did not fall within our original guidance above) are allowed to sell products for delivery or pick-up. That expanded guidance states: “Garden stores and greenhouses can remain open for purposes of maintaining inventory, and to fulfill online and phone orders for pick-up or delivery only.” This guidance applies to both standalone stores as well as garden centers that are part of a larger store (such as a garden center that is part of a hardware store or big box stores such as Lowes or Home Depot).
So, Syverson could be dealing with a local control issue. Anyway, the overall point still stands.
