 Good morning everyone. We have uh we have several things to cover today including our full vaccination schedule as well as a small change in guidance. But first today March 19th marks the one-year anniversary of Vermont's first confirmed deaths from COVID-19. Unfortunately in the year since we've lost 217 fellow Vermonters and over 538,000 fellow Americans. These aren't just numbers each represents a human being with families and friends who loved and cared about them. Every one of them in their own way made a mark on those around them and in their communities. While the commitment and dedication of all Vermonters has kept fatalities lower than any other state in the nation I know how tightly knit our communities are and that a single loss can have a huge impact. Since those first two deaths I've ordered flags to fly at half staff on the 19th of every month in honor of those we've lost. On this solemn anniversary I've done so again and I've also asked churches schools municipalities and others to ring their bells 14 times at 7 p.m. tonight to honor those we've lost and the loved ones they've left behind in all 14 counties of our state. As we mourn we can also be optimistic about the road ahead while doing what we can to prevent this level of loss in the future. As I've said before just one year ago no one thought we'd had these three highly effective vaccines to protect ourselves today and we're making great progress as of this morning 30 percent of Vermonters of Vermont adults have received at least one dose. This includes over 80 percent of those over the age of 70 and those over 16 with certain high-risk conditions that means before long the vast majority of those most at risk of severe illness and death will be protected and today I'm also outlining the remaining schedule for when every Vermonter 60 and over will be able to sign up to be vaccinated. As we've discussed we're going back to our age banding strategy which was successful because we know age is the top risk factor and because it's the most efficient and fastest way for us to get shots in arms. So beginning Thursday March 25th we'll move to all Vermonters age 60 and over then on Monday March 29th we'll go to 50 plus one week later April 5th all those over 40 and older and on April 12th those 30 and over will be eligible. Finally on April 19th one month from today anyone above the age of 16 will be able to schedule their vaccination. Now I want to repeat this by April 19th every single adult Vermonter will be able to schedule their appointment. Now to be clear these are the dates folks will be able to sign up it doesn't mean everyone will be fully vaccinated by that. When a new age band opens appointments should be available within two to three weeks and again depending on which vaccine you receive it takes a while before you're fully vaccinated. So as a reminder fully vaccinated means two weeks after your last dose. A good way to think about it is that everyone in each age band will have had the opportunity to be fully vaccinated about two months after their band opens up. So everyone in the final age band could be finished in June which is why I've used the 4th of July when I believe things will feel somewhat normal again. And by the way normal to me isn't a small cookout in your backyard with a couple of friends it's when things will feel similar to a pre-pandemic. To put a finer point on it for our high school seniors this timeline means that in June if we have the vaccination uptake we need and we have the supply you should be able to have a more traditional graduation and celebrate what you've accomplished with your friends and family. After seeing the second half of your junior year and now senior year turned upside down you deserve it and we're going to do everything we can to make it happen. As we vaccinate more Vermonters we'll also be able to turn the spigot a bit more often. We've done so recently allowing travel and gatherings for those who are vaccinated and also allowing two non-vaccinated households get together. Last week we updated our restaurant guidance to allow for six people per table. An effective Wednesday March 24th. Bars and clubs like the VFW or American Legion or ELGS will fall under the restaurant guidance. This means they can open under the restaurant guidance as long as they follow the capacity limits we have in place distancing is observed everyone is seated at tables and all other restaurant guidance is followed. There is a caveat however municipalities by action action of their governing body will be able to take stricter action if they so choose and as I've said in the next two to three weeks I'll outline our plan for emerging from the pandemic and how we'll return to normal by the 4th of July. While I'm sure this is welcome news to most I want to remind everyone it's more important than ever to follow the health guidance wear a mask keep your distance stay home when sick and continue to get tested so we can stop the spread of the virus in its tracks while we're in the last few laps of this race we've got to remember we're still in the race so a lot can happen so we've got to stay united in order to get through this with a few lives lost and emerge stronger than we were before in a few minutes secretary Smith will go into further detail about vaccines but first I'm going to turn it over to deputy secretary Heather Boucher of the agency of education to provide our weekly education update Heather thank you governor good morning my remarks today will largely focus on two areas an update on our coveted education recovery planning and highlighting the significant federal funding for recovery available to our education system but first I'll start with a quick update on surveillance testing as of 8 a.m. this morning 1314 have been tested for our positive this is a positivity rate of 0.31 percent and the state positivity rate is 1.3 percent with respect to education recovery recall that we are requiring school districts to assess student need and develop plans addressing that need in three areas social emotional functioning mental health and wellness engagement and truancy and academic achievement and success each of these areas is of critical importance none is a higher priority than the others they're all equally important to supporting our students the breadth of these topics means that districts will need to partner with other community and regional organizations to adequately meet student needs in the weeks and months ahead earlier this week districts submitted their membership rosters for recovery planning teams and I'd like to highlight a couple of them who are adopting creative approaches in St. Albans Maple Run school district is including a social worker early childhood representative and representative from the local division of child and family services in addition to teachers special education directors school counselors and other core district and school staff and their planning work Franklin northeast supervisor union includes representation from their regional designated agency providing mental health services as well as their regional cte career technical education center parents and community members still others will be working with pediatricians equity coordinators data analysts social emotional learning specialists and private clinicians in collaborative cross-sector approaches that promise to leverage the best thinking and therefore the best immediate and long-term outcomes for our students and we're excited about this response because we know it's going to take a community wide approach to fully mitigate the impact of covid on students to turn towards how we'll pay for recovery efforts I'll now provide some information on the significant federal dollars that both districts and the state agency will leverage to support recovery and here i'm referring to three allocations of funding under the elementary and secondary school emergency relief fund or esser which is part of the three consecutive federal covid relief bills that you're likely aware of all told school districts will receive over 398 million dollars in federal funds in vermont to be spent over the next three years on the following summer programming including initiatives to address learning loss expanded after school and extended learning opportunities mental health services infrastructural changes such as ventilation construction and the like needed to address the pandemic and recovery efforts technology upgrades and equipment and any activities that would be regularly funded through title dollars providing supports to historically marginalized students perkins dollars to support cte and other existing federal programs that support education in addition approximately 44 million esser dollars are allocated to the agency of education to address emergency needs as determined by the state agency resulting from covid 19 some guiding principles for this funding are that they're one-time funds and they should be really used in a strategic manner the funds should certainly be focused on education recovery because that's the overall funding goal and source of the funds and the recovery work in education is going to take some time and that's why the funds extend out into 2023 accordingly a we strategic recovery priorities for this funding include improving school facilities including indoor air quality and other health and safety issues supporting integrated service delivery models in all regions and addressing learning loss through expanded capacity for remote learning and finally echoing what governor scott said i'd like to wrap up with a message of gratitude for the hard work and collaboration educators and their partners have participated in this past year as well as hope for what lies ahead we're looking forward to summer in particular as a time of reconnection replenishment and above all fun for students and adults alike we've earned it thank you and i will turn the podium now to secretary smith thank you deputy secretary good morning everyone once again we'll cover a lot of ground on the vaccine front today as governor scott announced the vaccine registration schedule has been established for all remaining age groups we will rapidly move through these age groups which may surprise many vermoners of course this schedule relies on a steady and increasing supply of vaccine from the federal government but it aligns with what we have been told is our vaccine allocation from the white house i'll start off with the details for the group opening next week after that i will provide an update on our vaccination program as the governor had mentioned starting next week thursday march 25th we will begin registration for those 60 years old and older we ask that you create an account ahead of time by going to healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine when registration opens all you need to do is sign into your account and make an appointment on march 25th you can register again online at healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine this is the preferred method or you can call 855-722-7878 if you're unable to sign up online please remember and we wish to emphasize this as the governor did that the date registration opens for your age group is the date you are eligible to be vaccinated it will take uh some time to be fully vaccinated it will be approximately two months from the time you register to the time of your first and last dose appointments and you will not be considered fully vaccinated until two weeks after your last dose this is the the goal is to have all vermoners vaccinated by july 1st in terms of our overall progress as of this morning 166,100 people have been vaccinated against COVID-19 77,300 have received their first dose of vaccine 88,800 have received their first and last dose of vaccine again some of the statistics that the governor had had mentioned that are really impressive 85 percent of those 75 years old and older have been vaccinated have been vaccinated 83 percent of those 70 to 75 year olds have been vaccinated and nearly 60 percent of those 65 to 69 have been vaccinated as you remember 90 over 90 percent of our deaths have occurred with those in those categories that are 65 and above in terms of age turning to educator clinics 11,000 people have been vaccinated in those educator clinics and 7,300 people have made appointments for vaccinations so 18,300 educators and eligible childcare providers have received a first dose or have made an appointment for those first dose next week we'll we will have limited johnson and johnson allocation this was predicted and we have noticed that educator clinics have not been filling up as a result we will have fewer vaccine clinics for educators for next week only we anticipate we will receive more doses of johnson and johnson in the following week and we will ramp up vaccination for educators again the week of march 29th if you have not done so already i encourage all educators and eligible childcare providers to make appointments we will complete this group in the middle of april as we had originally planned so here are the educator clinics that haven't filled next week's appointments are still available and there are quite a bit quite a few slots in high park st albin's grand aisle and harpford um i just want to mention on our community vaccination clinics next week we'll have 91 open clinics located across the state next week the clinic the clinic in st albin's on march 26 we have 130 appointments that are available there as well corrections just to give an update on corrections right now 77 in-state vermont incarcerated individuals have been vaccinated with at least one dose of vaccine next week approximately 90 individuals are scheduled 78 vermont incarcerated individuals in mississippi have been vaccinated and we are working with a core civic to make sure that all vermont incarcerated individuals in mississippi are vaccinated we anticipate that any inmate who wants to be vaccinated will have at least one dose of vaccine by the end of april all of this will mean that what's this all mean well it means that if we continue to see steady increasing supply of vaccine we feel confident we will achieve the goal of offering vaccine to all vermonters 16 and above by july 1st this is incredibly exciting news but i want to remind everyone that it may again take up to two months after your age group is eligible for you to be considered fully vaccinated it i want to encourage everyone uh to create account an account ahead of time at health vermont.gov slash my vaccine so you're ready to make an appointment when it is your turn to make to to get vaccinated as you can see on the on the chart here we have a very accelerated vaccination schedule so please make your appointment as soon as please register on this site as soon as possible and then when your age band becomes available you can simply go on to the to the website and schedule an appointment has been an incredible year and throughout this difficult time i'm just proud to be a vermont or vermonters all across the state can be proud of how they responded to the pandemic vermont has consistently been one of the safest states to live in throughout this pandemic that is a result of vermonters coming together and doing the right thing masking staying six feet apart washing hands staying home with sick when they're sick and avoiding crowds i want to applaud vermonters for where we are today for all that you have done because we couldn't have accomplished what we're doing now without all of vermonters participating and the vaccination plan that we're releasing today is a result of that effort that vermonters have put forward we should be back to normal by july by the fourth of july as the governor had said and i just want to say one more time thank you i will now turn it over to dr levine for a health update thank you and good morning our cases are still within the expected range this week anywhere from the 50s to the 130s on a given day there are currently 22 people in the hospital with covid-19 five in the icu these are some of the lowest numbers we've seen in many weeks there are no additional deaths and the numbers and rate of deaths continue to be decreased with march now two-thirds over again clear testimony to the success of our current vaccination strategy as many including the governor have noted today marks the one-year mark of our first deaths in vermont due to covid-19 i recall standing in the lobby of the health department with the governor for that somber media briefing we all as a state felt those losses very deeply many in the state were scared and worried as the devastating impact of this virus truly sunk in and became a reality for us all we knew this virus spread quickly and that some of our most vulnerable were at risk but we certainly could not predict the toll that covid-19 would take and there we stood maskless in a crowded lobby reporters in person across from us we knew so little about this virus had so little testing capacity had this new evidence of how profound an impact it could have had on our entire state since that day in 2020 we've lost a total of 217 vermonas but i hope we can reflect today not on the number but on the people whose lives ended too soon our hearts go out to their families and loved ones who live with this loss every day now i'd like to also share more about our progress in providing vaccination opportunities for vermonas who are black indigenous and people of color as i've mentioned before our data shows that vermonas who identify as by pock are overrepresented in covid-19 cases and have significantly higher hospitalization and chronic disease rates relative to white non-hispanic people with covid-19 we've been working with community partners in berlington brattle borough and other parts of vermont to ensure access and provide and prioritize the equitable vaccination of by pock vermonas we've now organized the first of these specific clinics that allow a person who identifies as by pock and meets current state eligibility guidelines to be vaccinated with the rest of their household so currently that means one household member must be age 65 or older or age 16 or older with a high risk health condition we now have 262 by pock vermonas scheduled for a clinic in berlington tomorrow in partnership with the racial justice alliance and the city of berlington another 100 people are scheduled for a clinic in windham county in brattle borough next week thanks to our partner the n double acp these clinics are currently full we have already vaccinated 70 migrant farm workers in adison county on wednesday in partnership with the open door clinic you'll recall that these clinics are similar to those held for english language learners and those connected to the refugee and immigrant communities those clinics have now provided 678 first doses and 339 second doses for these communities these clinics continue weekly and vaccinate in the range of 100 people per week our partners there include the association of africans living in vermont and the u.s committee for refugees and immigrants of vermont you can find more information about these clinics on our website health vermont dot gov slash my vaccine we continue to plan for additional clinics and we'll share new information as we have it we must continue and extend the pace of vaccination we know we have much yet to do all of the efforts i've just described will continue in the light of the future vaccination timeline that you've seen here a huge thank you to all of our partners in these efforts they are so critical so committed so enthusiastic and so instrumental to the success of this initiative we still have much more to do to address historical harms and the resulting mistrust of health care and public health but these are important steps forward and making sure that by park communities get the support they need in the language they need in the locations they need to make informed choices and to get scheduled for vaccinations finally i do want to acknowledge that we have gotten some good news today learning when we will all be eligible to get the vaccine i know for many they have been anxious but now excited for their turn to get vaccinated but remember that we're still in a race against this virus and it's changing all the while we announced yesterday that vermont now had two of what the cdc calls variants of concern we first found the b117 variant which originated in the united kingdom and now have found it in eight specimens more recent lab results now show the b1429 strain first identified in california we have found the newer variant in three specimens this variant is thought to be 20 percent more transmissible recall that the b117 is considered to be 40 to 50 percent more transmissible these detections were found in samples from both chitin and franklin counties where we already know we are seeing an increase in covid 19 cases now viruses change constantly so this is expected but these variants are more transmissible and that means we really need to keep up prevention until more of us can be vaccinated wearing a mask staying six feet apart and gathering safely are really critical right now there has been of late a stalling in the dramatic decreases in new cases of covid around the country but especially in the northeast the two most likely reasons for this are a relaxation in following these simple precautions and the spread of the variant strains please keep the following in mind something i've said many times over the winter everyone is going to enjoy more freedoms as the spring and summer unfold and this will be wonderful indeed but to fully enjoy them and to really find our way out of this pandemic we must on a parallel course continue to follow the simple guidance of masks and distancing and cautious travel along with getting registered for vaccination as soon as your age band opens up and please get tested especially if you're having symptoms of any kind even a headache cough fatigue or a runny nose and stay home and away from work school or other events until you get a negative test result i am actually hearing stories from our interviews of cases that indicate people have at times assumed they had a cold or a sinus infection instead of first thinking they might have covid during this time of an ongoing pandemic so let my words be a reminder that in spite of vaccination becoming a truly wonderful and long-awaited reality the pandemic has yet to disappear this is the only way for us all to stay ahead in the race if we can use our prevention and testing tools and get vaccinated as soon as it's our turn we can achieve a level of community immunity that will bring us all out of this pandemic we can cross the public health finish line sooner together governor scott thank you commissioner labine we'll now open it up to questions thanks governor so how many vaccines are you expecting to get each week that would make this accelerated timeline of vaccinating vermontous costly yeah i don't have that right in front of me but we expect to continue to get the allocation of the maderna and fiser as we have over the last few weeks and continue to get that supply the uptick will be in the johnson and johnson in particular but they are anticipating increased supplies in the other as well so every single week as you know we have this conversation with the white house with the national governor's association all the governors on the call and they give us a three week window they're hoping to give us a little bit further look into the future next week into what what could happen throughout april so we're confident with what they've told us and we believe you know we'll be able to meet meet we wouldn't be putting this out if we didn't think we could make it obviously we've been able to accomplish everything that we've we've told you i think to date and we have no reason to believe that we won't the future i'm just a clarifying point how many people are in each of these age bands we it's on the website and we didn't we decided not to include it in this uh graphic but we do have it on the website and we can i think it'd be easier for you to look there but it's a it takes into account you have to remember there are a number of people because of the chronic conditions national guard the the teachers the health care providers and so forth who have already been vaccinated within those age bands so we've taken some steps to to make sure that we're being accurate so that's why you might see a discrepancy between the actual number if you look at demographically and what we feel is the number so but it but it's fairly accurate anything you want to add to that yeah it's it is on the website to help the department website at this point and then one last question maybe this is for secretary smith or deputy secretary boucher but you mentioned that vaccine uptake and signups for teachers hasn't been you know we still have open appointments uh there was that survey that went out said over 80 percent of teachers wanted it so where's the discount why are teachers not signing up you know i'll i'll try and answer that first and they can add their viewpoint as well i think we're still early um we did receive some good news i think it was close to 90 percent uptake in terms of those in the staff and teachers and staff within the education community as well as childcare providers so we need to give it a little bit more time because it's it's still fresh it's still new this is only our second week now so we need to give them an opportunity so i'm i'm hopeful we're not sounding the alarm at this point but we are advocating for those who haven't signed up yet to do so to look for those open appointments so that we can get the the vast majority of that 90 percent or whatever that number was in the beginning who surveyed and said that they'd be willing to to sign up to be vaccinated to be vaccinated so i look forward to a positive result thanks governor governor given how the pandemic and the response here to to vaccination and and mask wearing and all of that nationally is such a political football and people are seeing that here in vermont vermonters are seeing that on the news reading it in the newspapers magazines etc i mean you're obviously optimistic how optimistic are you seeing our situation here and how do you convey that to people here in vermont that we're actually doing the right thing you know from from the very beginning i've given a great amount of credit to vermonters for doing the right thing complying with the guidance that we've established and we've been a bit of an outlier when compared to other states across the country and i believe that we may be an outlier in this regard as well i have my concerns as we move through the age banding as we get to the younger ages in particular but we'll step up the pr campaign we hope all of you will as well and because it's really important as dr. levine has stated so many times if we want to reduce the amount of spread as particularly with the the variance that we're seeing the mutation of this virus that the the real answer is to get to it quick right stop it now before it has an opportunity to mutate further so that's why it's really important this is a race to the finish and if we can get there if we can get as many people compliant and get their shots and arms as possible we'll be able to stop the virus in its tracks in some respects to keep it from spreading in a different way that's levine and i couldn't agree more you know and the fact that vermanus have been unique throughout this they weren't unique they all had some pandemic fatigue too like the rest of the country but probably less so but i believe vermanus can be unique to the very end of this race there's no reason why we should suddenly stop being unique we did see some interesting data today looking at the fact that the northeast is the part of the country that's having the uptick in cases but verman was unique on the map of the northeast and having the least impact of that in terms of numbers of active new cases compared to the rest of the region i hope we can stay that way for sure so we've recognized the power that vermanus have with this pandemic all along and they have the power yet to go since you're there doctor and looking at the uh at the time frame that we're looking at there and comparing that with what we saw last year when the uh when our rates started really going down sort of corresponds with that is that give you some hope there that's a tough question because with the variant strains being sort of a wild card and with even the rest of the country leveling off small decreases as opposed to where they were before it's a little harder to predict most of the predictions from modeling that the cdc and others are doing shows continued improvement but nowhere near at the same pace that it was occurring in the last month or two so we'll see there might be something about seasonality or cycles of this virus because you'll recall that the northeast kind of had all of its action at one point in time and then got better while all of a sudden the south and the west were getting much much worse and then later than that the midwest were so there seems to be some cyclical activity too that may or may not be scientifically explainable at this point in time i'm just encouraged to be honest about the fact that the pace of this is so much i think more dramatic than any vermoner might have imagined uh in the last month or two because usually we come to the podium and say well this is what we're getting in terms of vaccine and this is what we can do with it but now we can tell you very enthusiastically and energetically this is where we can go and before the summer arrives uh if we all continue to do all the things we're talking about and get vaccinated we're going to really come out on top thank you good morning could we talk a little bit about logistics here uh you know it looks like you're going to be opening this thing up to you know three or four hundred thousand vermoners in the next month how aren't you going to need more clinic locations people injecting the shot won't your reservation system be overwhelmed or are you adding capacity what can we expect to to see yeah we've been ramping up to this point we actually feel as though we have the capacity based on the supply we have coming in now just remember it's all about the supply we feel we can meet the demand uh and with the injections and and the uh the the strategy we're using uh to to administer this so it's really dependent on the supply uh secretary smith anything you want to offer steward the governor is absolutely right we um of course i wouldn't say anything different uh but the um the the the fact is a few press conferences ago maybe three or four press conference ago i talked about how we were ramping up our ability by mobilizing the national guard um in several tranches um the last one being in the first part of april in terms of the activation the way that we're looking at bringing on other pharmacies casco walmart those uh partners the fqhcs how we're sort of ramping up and during that press conference i said we're going to be ramping up uh to the ability to administer about 35 000 doses a week that's in line with what you're seeing here um is that we'll be able to administer up to 30 to 35 000 doses a week and uh that is what the schedule sort of calls for so we have the infrastructure in place we've been building it for about three weeks now and we feel confident that if we get the doses we can get it into the arms of people you got to remember we're doing about 7 000 doses a day right now um so it it's not a heavy lift to go to um what we're talking about uh on this schedule okay uh will the reservation system open at 815 on each of those dates yeah our anticipation that it will if it's changed i'll announce it but we did stagger it about a week out just to make sure that the registration system you know we've had we've looked at the age bands the largest will be 16 plus 16 to 29 that'll be the largest age band but we have um we've handled uh these sort of uh populations before and we'll handle them here uh as we move forward all right finally i did get a viewer question asking if the administration plans to bring back the travel map in the spring that will compare us to our neighboring states and give us some sense about safety uh is that coming back um you know we've talked about that it won't be brought back in the traditional fashion because we're going to be i'm going to be talking about what our plan is uh in a couple within the couple weeks from now as to how we emerge from this and um so but we've contemplated whether we should be you know utilizing the map to show uh people where we we feel or you know what's going on in the rest of the region um so we'll take that under advisement but we may bring it back just for uh to provide some insight as to to where there's a prevalence of the virus and whether it's not we're bragging rights thank you that's right good morning this question's for dr levine i believe on wednesday the new york times published an article about covid long haulers who's symptoms improved after receiving vaccines do you know how many remanters are long haulers and would the state consider including them in the chronic conditions categories for vaccines they're very timely questions lisa thank you for those um we don't have a good handle on the percentage of the i guess we're over 17 000 cases uh of covid in the state that have become long haulers all we have is the guesstimates of the uh research establishment nationwide which ranges from one to ten percent um so i have a little trouble understanding you know how to answer that question because we just don't have uh good national international or local data to to give you a firm number um with regard to prioritizing them uh that issue has actually not come up because as you know this news about them potentially doing better after the first dose of vaccine uh has just arrived on the scene so it was never even a subject of our deliberations we'll take it under advisement but i have to say this is so preliminary this information and i don't want to do an injustice to it by calling it anecdotal but it it really is somewhat anecdotal uh that i'm a little reluctant to craft firm policy around it especially when you can see the rapidity with which every remaner is going to be able and eligible to get vaccinated it almost doesn't make that much of a difference if you will because we're talking weeks as opposed to months and months and months separation between groups great thank you very much that's it for me can you hear me we can governor you said a little bit earlier that normal to you won't be just a cookout in the backyard with a few friends um curious to hear what you have thought about for guidance when everybody has been vaccinated that is willing to accept the vaccine how long you expect to keep masking and distancing guidance in place well what will happen from my vantage point is when we get to that uh fourth of july uh stake in the ground so to speak um is that everything will be somewhat lifted uh and it'll be purely that uh advisement guidance um but uh there it won't be mandatory but there i think we should get be prepared there are going to be a number of people who will want to continue to wear masks and we would advocate that it it might make sense to um but um but i would see at that point in time uh where the mandates will be lifted okay thank you one other question there was a lot of news being posted today about three feet being an acceptable distance uh they were talking particularly for kids in school but generally what are your what are your feelings about those guidelines you know i i watched uh dr fouchi i think was last weekend uh and he was predicting that maybe the cdc would be making some change there in their guidance and in schools in particular from six feet to three feet um that would be a bit of a game changer for us as we have talked about previously the the big stumbling block the the challenge in some respects was a vaccination of school staff child care providers and so forth um so we've done that uh that's ongoing right now the next hurdle that we've begun to begin to hear is what are we going to do about the distance so if the cdc comes out and decides to go from six feet to three feet uh that's a that's a game changer in terms of i i see no reason why we wouldn't be back in in person uh in remote in person instruction before long is that impacted at all by the fact that the registration for educators hasn't been filling up well again i want to give uh give us some time i mean there there have been a number what did you i think did you say 19 000 i think it was 18 18 000 thus far have received their first dose is that right let me just get the numbers for you let me get it accurately yeah it's 18 300 educators and eligible child care providers who have received their first dose or have made an appointment okay so 18 300 uh teachers or child care providers have uh had their first dose or signed up so we're still uh anticipating more signing up and i'm being able to get their first dose so i think it's still again a little bit early we've only been at this uh two weeks with the education system so we need to give it a little bit more time and uh and then we'll react accordingly but but i again the up the survey had said uh close to i believe it was around 90 percent uh we're willing to to be vaccinated so i'm looking forward to that okay thank you yes we got a call from a salon owner wanting to know when those businesses to their capacities increase again um if you um a little bit of patience if you wait until the first week in april within the next two weeks i'll be showing you what our plan is and that will include some of those questions that you might be asking uh now or or those readers who might have questions so um we'll be opening the spigot uh even uh over the next couple of weeks as we did today with bars and clubs um but um but that will it will make much more sense once we're able to lay that out uh to uh in a transparent way uh so that you can anticipate what's going to happen over the next two to three months okay thank you thanks uh good morning everybody happy friday um another follow-up question about the uh the educator clinics not filling up and beyond just the educators uh the percentage of the groups that have not been getting the vaccine or the vaccinations have you encountered much philosophical objection to it people who don't want it or do you think it's just a function of not having been able to make the appointments yet or not getting around to it is this in the education system as wilson okay well yeah i mean both again from from the education system perspective the survey was there wasn't much hesitancy uh in obtaining the vaccination so i don't think there's going to be anything there but i'm i'll refer to secretary smith wilton to go back into sort of those mature groups that have already sort of had the opportunity to take the vaccine long-term care facilities we saw tremendous uptake among the residents and most of the staff in those in the medical area in 1a we saw very good uptake i think uvm had reported yesterday to me and i don't know if it's scientific or not but they told me that it was uh near 90 percent on the uptake on their on their uh staff if you look at um 75 and above it's over 85 percent if you look at 70 and above it's it's going to be near 85 percent it you know we're at 80 we're over 80 right now if you look at the 65 and above that is climbing up um and probably will be in the 80s as well so if you look across the whole spectrum um we've had tremendous uptake here in terms of a vaccine we've had some pockets that we we've been a little bit concerned about and dr levine and i talked with uh state and local officials in sx county to get some ideas of what we can do to help out on the uptake there um and had a very successful meeting yesterday they had some really good ideas about what to do and we're uh planning to um double redouble our efforts up in sx county as well so i think when you i would hate to have you focus just on sort of the availability of spot slots in clinics because as the governor said it's a little bit too early uh to make any judgment there it's only been two weeks that we've had this uh open and it's um and you know we like the governor said it's 18100 people that either have been vaccinated or um will be vaccinated because they've scheduled an appointment okay the the pocket in sx county you mentioned is is that a philosophical objection or is it a practical one of finding a place to go i think it's a big county in terms of land mass obviously and what we've got to do is get what when we talked to state and local officials yesterday is the ability to you know we had some clinics that weren't filling up up there and so i think it i think it's more of the ability to communicate and we're going to be putting up road signs i've spoken with this was a this was a um recommendation from one local official up there and i've spoken with aot on this we're going to be putting up road signs that will tell when the clinics are and how to register and maybe that will help as well but um those are some of the things that we're looking at okay so you haven't heard any any communicated philosophical objection i i have not heard anybody say that okay okay great thank you very much thanks rebecca uh deputy boucher one clarification i think you mentioned 1300 uh plus tests and four positive cases just wondering where those four positive cases are and which schools have alerted their communities or will be alerting their communities about positive cases i don't actually don't have that um data i would have to get back to you on that i just have the overall data this morning sorry okay yeah if you or secretary french and have somebody send that along uh case we wanted to do a follow-up question before the end of the press conference that'd be great governor uh sorry maybe commissioner levine can just to your point about when the schools are notified you can tell you the contact tracing process thanks yeah whoever these four individuals were that test positive obviously that's known to them that's known to their employer in the school district uh they and the health department get together and determine how much and whose responsibility it will be to do what specific contact tracing around that case um if the case was even present in school during an infectious period so you can rest assured that uh it is not a community-wide announcement that needs to be made usually because it's only one case and it may have had very minimal impact on any of the other people living in this community or active in the school fully understand that but also realize that it may have an impact on the school so i'm just wondering how many are in fact you know but i'll move on governor uh um um tom kind of went part way down the path about the three feet versus six feet but i did want to follow up uh earlier this week it was disclosed that the national average for children getting infected with COVID-19 was under six percent the presentation showed vermont's average was listed as 13 percent i believe wondering why vermont is more than the national average for infected children governor what is vermont not doing that the rest of the nation is doing to protect children i you know i haven't seen those statistics mike so i'd like to at least reserve judgment until then i will say i believe they came from dr they came from dr levine at a presentation for human resources directors on wednesday this week it was forwarded to me okay i may i may refer to dr levine but i will say this um in terms of we do have a fairly robust testing regiment here in the state i think many other states have reduced theirs and we have continued to have a number of people um utilizing that that platform which we we advocate for um but uh but i don't know what that means in terms of the overall population dr levine yes i did present to the human resource association uh though we never talked about kids um but i'm thinking back on our website and i think the number you're referring to has to do with the percentage of all vermont covid cases that have been in children which may well be 13 percent with the majority of those being in the 18 and 19 year old age range uh higher teens but i'm going to have to i'm using my memory here to to think back on what those numbers look like but that's probably the number you're referring to and um i think in vermont that number if you think 13 percent is high may look a little higher because of some of the nature of some of the outbreaks we've had um earlier in the course of covid where there were multi-generational families impacted and children tested positive though they weren't actually ill but that probably increased our rate that's all i can say right now because uh i'm i'm going to have to really look at the number you just chose and make sure we're talking about the same number yeah if you could send over the year's slide presentation that you gave those human resource directors that had called me about those numbers that'd be great yeah sure i'm going to look at them myself yep super thank you very much everybody it might also add um dr levine if that includes the 18 year olds uh when you consider the number of cases we've had in uh some of our higher education um our universities and colleges and so forth that could add to that number um significantly okay good thank you Chris Roy new for daily express yes thanks rebecca good afternoon uh just a few moments to go i heard from a reader who would like to know once somebody is fully vaccinated when he or she has to get another vaccination it's in they were wondering if it's six months or a year or exactly uh when the next time is up again i'll refer to dr levine but i don't believe that's been determined as yet they're still doing the trials keeping track of the data and uh i don't think anyone knows uh at this point anything dr levine i think dr levine it doesn't have anything to add we just don't know and uh and i'm sure the cvc will be looking at that and providing us guidance in the future and and coming up with whether it's going to be another booster shot or what it's going to mean okay great thank you thank you rebecca good afternoon governor uh i just wanted to clarify on these new uh or or at least more concerning variants detected in franklin and shitting county can you give us a better idea of when these people would have been tested positive are we talking you know in the last 72 hours are we talking two weeks ago four weeks ago obviously take some time to get these tests back tested positive and then take take the dna testing from them i'm also wondering if that's attributing to some of the influx in cases or are you seeing people you know not following protocols or is a combination or is it something else that they be uh contributing to that influx dr levine all all very important points to respond to so first of all um anytime we get a whole genome sequencing result it's generally a week after we sent the sample um because that's how long it takes to get this back the um b117 variant which is the one that we become most familiar with is being detected on a week by week basis so that's real time that's happening the new one the b1429 was actually from a sample several weeks ago however there was no requirement to report that result to state labs at that point in time because that variant was not considered to be a vo c variant of concern it was just another variant that people didn't think was very important about 72 hours ago the cdc uh determined based on newer information that this is 20 percent more transmissible and for that and other reasons should be considered a variant of concern so all of a sudden we got a report saying some samples that vermont had sent from a number of weeks ago actually showed this variant so you've been seeing that in vermont so uh we obviously right now have sent samples very quickly to see if that variant is being seen consistently at greater numbers or what have you so we'll know more about that either on next week's testing or the weeks uh after testing the other thing everyone should be understanding of is that we're literally sending 20 samples a week these are not representative of the entire state of vermont or even a county that they may come from these are very random in a sense because of the sampling errors but at the same time they are very much targeted to be the right samples to send based on the clinical and epidemiologic characteristics of the pure person who had the test that was positive so we're really trying to make it a high yield enterprise by going after those cases that we think have the highest likelihood of representing a variant but that doesn't mean every county in vermont has had that situation arise where it's that easy to do and it's widespread through the state all we know right now is in these chitin and in franklin county instances that the variants were seen eight times and three times for each of those variants is that clear yeah i think that's a big help uh moving on uh governor we had a reader reach out wanted to know if a business could hold a private event or or even a public event and allow only those who could show a fully vaccinated card to enter and if that would change any of the requirements that that they're required to to operate under for instance a restaurant breaking the the six person per table rule or a bar that maybe wouldn't otherwise be able to open and i think a lot of this is coming from the perception that that the rules for gathering in homes has been relaxed a lot and and may even be uh more relaxed than if you were to go to a public establishment then i guess the question here though is can a private company say you can only enter with a vaccination card and would that could they could they then change some of the rules around what they do you mean in a workplace like requiring a vaccine to work uh in a workplace in a restaurant in a in a bar uh any of that any of that kind of thing can can uh you know can uh can a business say you can only enter if you're vaccinated and and if so does that change the protocols that they they have to follow yeah i i that's one of those what ifs that i don't have the answer to um i don't know if secretary curly does but um something we can contemplate but nothing that i've nobody's asked us this that i know of i i can take a stab at what i think is the crux of the question um so you are correct currently we permit fully vaccinated individuals to gather in a home and our business operating guidance doesn't open that up as wide at this point and as the governor just mentioned it's something that we're talking about internally to try to find you know the sweet spot and so uh i think that you can expect to have more clarity on that in the next couple of weeks when the governor rolls out the plan um but currently businesses don't have the ability to bypass um threshold gathering threshold uh at a restaurant or in a theater for example um simply because people are vaccinated but it is something that we are working on would uh would would a would a business be allowed to bar people that aren't vaccinated is that allowed i doubt that it's uh well i don't know i i that would for a lawyer i'm not sure how to answer that yeah that was the question that i i wasn't i was struggling with i don't know um and we haven't we haven't been asked that so it's something we can contemplate but again some of what we've um we're going to be laying out in uh before april one or the first week of april might clarify a few of those issues thank you appreciate your time governor appreciate your time uh secretary furley and dr levine as mentioned earlier the cbc this morning released its new guidance for schools shortening the physical distancing guidelines to three feet from six feet governor you said earlier it's a game changer i'm curious if dr levine supports the three-foot distancing guidance in schools from a health and safety standpoint mishael levine yeah i'm going to try to answer your question completely but with the caveat that this information was embargoed until 15 minutes ago so i may not have the most exhaustive review of everything that they've put out thus far um but they basically did say um that uh a minimum of three feet uh for children in elementary school and if you're in middle school or high school the same would apply but it does vary by the amount of transmission of virus that's occurring within the community and i don't know the definitions of what low medium substantial and high are if they're similar to what cms put out for our long-term care facilities high would mean a percent positivity rate of 10 percent or greater which we don't see in vermont anyways and that would mean that schools in vermont at any level would be eligible for the three-foot rule they also have uh caveats in there about making sure that the teachers and the adults maintain a six-foot spacing and that in certain common areas like lobbies and uh auditoriums that um this three-foot spacing does not apply nor in the community and outside school activities that students would be engaged in their daily lives so we have been you know looking for this kind of guidance for quite some time now you've heard all of the compelling uh discussions regarding how our children and adolescents are not doing so well and uh the better and quicker we can get them back into their in-person learning environment the better so i'm pretty comfortable with it at this point in time there were three publications that they put out with this press release from the morbidity mortality weekly report which i have had the most cursory of reviews of in the limited time we've had here uh with this being published today and um i'm going to have to really look a lot more rigorously at them to give you a more confident answer but i do know that uh if there's anything good going on in washington now it is the return of the cdc to its appropriate high pedestal uh not being a politically directed organization but being a science and data-driven organization so if uh dr walensky and the rest of the team there have put out a compelling argument and feel committed to this i feel much more comfortable than i might have felt uh a year ago thank you and deputy secretary brichet do you support it and do you think schools in the state will change their stance on returning to full in-person learning based on this new cdc guidance yes so as uh dr labine uh commissioner labine just said we just uh got this uh immediately within the past 15 minutes so uh what will happen now is we will get together the agency of education the department of health and we will look exactly at what those uh guidance points are and we will certainly be advising the field accordingly i'm not prepared to weigh in um strongly on that until we can actually take a look at what uh the guidance particulars are um but we certainly are supportive of students actually getting back into classrooms um for exactly the reasons that i talked about this morning actually in terms of recovery great thank you thanks again i would just add if dr fouchi dr walensky and now dr labine feel after looking at the information that it's safe that gives me great comfort and it should give all of our motors comfort as well governor the house is preparing its budget proposal and lawmakers are looking to use a lot of the new federal money the state will be receiving from the american rescue plan do you think it's prudent and this money in the state budget i think it's uh i'm concerned to be quite honest with you and blunt i think that we're getting ahead of ourselves in some respects we just received uh the inks hardly dry on the legislation and we haven't received any money yet we haven't received any guidance on it yet and uh and our we're already trying to spend it so or they're trying to um direct it in the uh legislature um so i have my concerns about that uh there's at this point in time it appears to me we should uh at least figure out what the the guidance is going to be and uh and again the treasury has to develop that and uh we have some time we do know that it's uh more flexible than the first cares act the where we in the first package uh we had to spend or allocate all the money by December 31st this uh this recovery package gives us about three years so we need to invest this wisely it can't be from my perspective utilizing it for programmatic needs we should invest it in infrastructure and we know what our needs are for instance broadband wastewater water systems and so forth climate change initiatives and things that we uh we know we had some shortcomings in the past but with this tranche of money it gives us the ability to build a better foundation and to fill those gaps that we've sorely needed in the past but but again i'm i'm a little concerned that they're moving that quickly on spending money that we don't know again all the details of can i ask are there any particular areas of concern based on the proposals that have been floated so far are there allocations that you specifically would would object to well again i don't know all of what they are doing at this point in time it's happening very very quickly like in the last two days so i i i just can't comment because i just know that they're spending money all of a sudden i read in an article i didn't hear anything from the legislature but i read in an article where they had proposed spending money in a certain area so it's all happening in real time and we just need to just take a deep breath and and we don't need a free feeding frenzy here what we need to do is to make sure that we're doing this in a strategic way that will help us in the future and that we don't that would make sure that it fills needs that we have right now i think i believe like a housing need how we know we need housing in the state infrastructure needs that that we've had some shortcomings on and not put us in a position where we can't afford to pay for something in the future so that's where i've i've been talking about this since my budget came out now again i acknowledged during the budget address that we were we were using what we knew at the time and that we knew that there might be another package coming and we'd have to reflect on that and and change and and i think the the house is in the same position house representatives they have to get their budget out i think by today so they're they're ramping up to do that and we're going to all have to acknowledge that there's going to be changes along the way but but again there's there's plenty of money in the existing year the fiscal year we're in right now to get us through and there's plenty of money we have a surplus so let's let's take this let's slow down just a little bit and make sure that we're doing this in the right way give us the the biggest bang for the buck the the best return on investment possible for the future thank you governor dr labine i was looking over the health department's report from december which broke down the impact of covid on biker monitors and some of the takeaways were that the community outbreaks from june largely affected for monitors and multi-generational households as well as essential workers and as he mentioned cases tend to be higher among younger members of the biker community is the state confident that it can close the gap for vaccines among the biker community without opening up specific categories like essential workers i'm just thinking about the community members who are at risk for covid because they're younger working persons that aren't yet eligible or don't live with someone who's eligible yeah thanks for that question i don't know if you're in front of a television or not but i would just look at the screen because really that tells the whole story we can really get through using this approach in a very rapid period of time getting to the goal the final goalpost of really getting all those vaccinated who want to be vaccinated in the state of vermont as quickly expeditiously as possible so even if you're 25 years old you're eligible to go on and set up your appointment one month from today that's pretty rapid the way things are going and then within two months of that you will be fully vaccinated so i think that's the major message i'd like to convey today and that we will be able to continue to achieve our goals with the bi-park population by continuing to be consistent with this process doesn't mean we are going to stop anything we're currently doing so all of the efforts that are going to that population with regard to education registration aid with registration appropriate access to the vaccine special clinics that make it more accessible focusing on the multi-generational which by the way i'm hearing from around the country that no one has focused on nationwide we are focusing on it because it's a data-driven approach based on the data in vermont none of that is going away while we continue to do this approach if i may if i may take advantage of your calling me to the podium i did find on our most recent weekly update since kids have come up as a big part of the conversation today at this point in time children represent 20 percent of vermont cases and if we look in a child means under age 20 26 percent of these children are in the 18 to 19 year old age group so just to provide some grounding on the numbers that are being thrown around thank you great thank you i wanted to go back to the previous question about the budgetary concerns and the use of the recovery money and ask secretary young if there was anything that i missed that you wanted to include secretary young has been closer to this issue than i have over the last couple of days thank you governor um yes there is to the um question quite a bit of allocating going on as we speak since about Tuesday in two separate vehicles h315 which was on the senate floor for second meeting this morning as well as under consideration as you noted in the ongoing budget work that's being done in house appropriations for the 2022 budget um the understanding is there's about a million a billion dollars i know i keep missing that of b a billion dollars of more flexible money in the state fiscal recovery section of the american rescue plan that will go to the state for various projects and some really exciting opportunities there as you noted for water or um broadband uh infrastructure um that we all know is costly so it it is um something we're watching but i i think the goal is for house appropriations to spend about half of half of the money uh in in the budget um and then once they get the budget done to spend the other half in another spending bill so you know it is concerning that it's moving so quickly there's not a lot of the input into the decisions that are being made we hope that you know there will be a slowdown um after the big bill is passed out of house where people are are being more um thoughtful about where the money is going and perhaps involving you know more um more public input and administration input at this point as a reminder as well we have a number of businesses that are in dire straits particularly in the hospitality sector that could use our help right now and that's what we should be focusing on because they will we need to make sure they recover and survive over the next two or three months so that we can put people back to work we still have you know 30 over 30 000 people on ui and pua and we want them to get back to work so we need the businesses there in order for that to happen so it's all got to be it's all interconnected but we we need to prioritize and make sure that we're taking care of the emergency first hi um governor i was wondering uh when you might be using more restrictions uh around long-term care facilities in the state i know that dale had issued some updated guidance this week that i believe went into effect today around some visitation uh restrictions getting relaxed but do you have a timeline for when things might be returning to more of a normal for uh for these homes yeah secretary smith could you comment on that thanks liam for the question as you as you've pointed out we are updating our guidelines based upon cms guidelines as you know the skilled nursing facilities are completely uh guided by cms guidelines and we try to dovetail for the others what those guidelines are the cms guidelines are opening up a visitation um and in particular talking about contact physical contact contact and how you do that um we'll continue to update as cms updates uh but i think you know our schedule is dictated a little bit by cms on the skilled nursing facilities but um we are you know we mentioned about three weeks ago how much we were opening up we're opening up even more now uh and also allowing things that we just haven't allowed in about a year uh to happen now there are protocols that are still in place uh to make sure that our long-term care facilities are are safe but at the same time i think you'll see based upon what we have talked about with uh various um with the long-term care facilities over this week and the guidelines we're issuing now really um start to uh open up those facilities in a much greater way than they have i will say in the next few weeks i'll probably have an announcement on adult day and other areas that will be opening up uh in the in the very near future as well as vaccination starts taking hold here in um in in this state and it has quite significantly taken hold in the uh 65 plus range and if if you look at sort of uh we get slides every morning and if you look at where uh deaths have and COVID cases have really fallen off it is 70 and plus i mean it is unbelievable in terms of the reduction in cases in that in that area so i think you're gonna you know um dale has opened it up even more based on cms guidelines i think you'll see us opening up other parts of um of those um seniors you know the day-to-day life of those seniors in other in other instances as well okay um and a broader question on reopening um one of the things we don't have a great sense of right now is how long uh the sort of immune response from the COVID-19 vaccination lasts and so i'm wondering you know as we look at July it's potentially a time when things return more to normal on how content are you that that will be able to do that i mean at that point people that got the vaccine first in December and January will have been vaccinated almost six months and if um you know their immunity doesn't last that long couldn't we be in a position of just getting more outbreaks down down the road um i'm gonna ask dr. Levine to answer part of this but i just want to remind everyone we are not going to get rid of this virus regardless of how well we do and with the vaccination process and and uh how well we do in other regards it's going to be with us for quite some time but what we're trying to do is reduce um the number of deaths the hospitalizations so it doesn't impact our way of life but it will be here and it could continue to to provide for positive cases over the next year two years it's just going to be another strain of a virus but we are i'm i'm confident in that we'll be able to return to normal in after the fourth of july but i don't know how long this the vaccine will last dr. Levine so we're talking about two kinds of immunity one is really natural immunity meaning you've had the infection and then develop antibody responses and the other type is vaccine mediated immunity because you got the vaccine we saw some very encouraging data recently that's looking at people who actually had covid and looking at how long their antibodies seem to be present and numbers like six to eight months are now being thrown out uh as preliminary uh analysis of that data we also now have vaccines that even though i agree many people in the older set and in the healthcare worker workforce got their dose in january people who got their doses as part of the studies got them much earlier in 2020 so those are the kinds of data points we're really going to be looking at to understand the duration of vaccine mediated immunity i don't think you're going to see a widespread campaign in the summertime to get people revaccinated who just got vaccinated earlier in the year i think it's more likely if you see anything it will be discussions about tweaking the vaccine itself especially the mRNA vaccine which is a lot easier to do this as i'm calling it tweaking with so that the right immunity is given to the person so if there's various strains that have taken over and we're concerned about the fact that current vaccines may not adequately cover them or just cover them in a way that protects you but you could use more protection uh discussions and manufacture of those kinds of enhanced vaccines will come out so it won't be a matter of giving you a booster to your immunity it'll be a matter of giving you a newer type of immunity towards what's circulating out there now and keep in mind in july uh it is going to be summertime people will be outdoors a lot more and we don't see a lot of viral transmission in the outdoor settings generally that's been one of the nicer features if i could use the word of the of the virus and we've really gotten comfortable from a lot of literature and from perhaps protest experiences in this country where we did not see a lot of virus transmission occurring outdoors so that's all i can say for now thank you to herd immunity um one thing i'm also hearing as a potential note of concern is that um people under 16 obviously still aren't able to get the vaccine and i've even seen some analysis that indicates that the u.s probably won't reach herd immunity until it's able to vaccinate the younger population um i just i'm just kind of curious how that will play into like the guidance and the you know ability of people to do things um during this recurrence and all will say michel avine i'd like to say it should have no impact at all because if we're doing all the things that we're supposed to be doing and as the governor's indicated these aren't getting thrown away these masks because we got a vaccine in our arm they're all going to continue on through the spring and certainly up until july fourth and then we'll have more news about how that may or may not impact our lives as the rest of 2021 evolves but that's part of the reasons why everyone is going to be continuing to do those behaviors even though life will be markedly different and i hope for all improved um keep in mind that uh several of the vaccine manufacturers uh who have already had their uh vaccines receive eua or in other parts of the world receive approval are already progressing on with trials in those under age 16 so we'll have more information on that in a timely way we hope as well um but i don't want people to again focus inordinately on herd immunity or community immunity whatever you choose to call it uh we don't know the precise number with this virus uh at this time low ball estimates are in the 60 percent range high ball in the 85 percent range so the truth is probably somewhere in between based on experience with other viruses of this sort um and we've seen the incredible uptake statistics that secretary smith talked about in our uh 65 and older 70 and older age ranges and in our health care workforce so we'll have to see how that goes but that may actually turn out to be um much more promising than you might have imagined uh as well so uh we shouldn't fixate on the number at this point in time we should really fixate on um what's going to happen in terms of our daily lives our daily behaviors our mitigation strategies etc and just to clarify i mean hurt we there's a possibility of uh vaccines having an effect on public cases before herd immunity right i mean since it's 50 percent of the population can't get the virus um it does provide some level of protection yeah i mean every time a person gets vaccinated that brings us even that much closer to much more overall health in our state and much more i equate that with economic and other recovery in our state as well uh it all fits together but you're right even if the population at large hasn't reached 60 or 80 percent yet because they haven't all been able to get their vaccine yet the people who have got the vaccine are still protected against the most serious outcomes and though they may get a mild illness at most from uh covid while they've been vaccinated uh they shouldn't get anything on the more severe end of the spectrum and keep in mind again that you know we are in vermont very blessed by having had such a low uh disease rate from covid compared to really the whole country uh but that means we do have less natural immunity so we are all going to have to be reliant on the vaccine immunity by and large uh to protect us okay um my second question is just more of a clarifying one i think uh for secretary smith you mentioned the inmate that has gotten vaccines so far there hasn't been a change to um the eligibility rules for inmates correct and you are not considering you know vaccinating inmates earlier than the general population yeah there has not been a change uh and they will be vaccinated like everyone else with the age banding okay thank you hello is the state confident they're able to reach all by possible monitors uh through these organizations that they're using for outreach or might there be some that may not be connected to these organizations that could be falling through the cracks i think the reality is that that we are concerned that there will be some falling through the cracks and uh we're going to do everything we can to make sure that they get the information they need and to make the right decisions but it is a concern of ours dr levine anything i would echo the concern but we stand a far better chance of at least doing it with the approach we're doing so that we try to connect with as many as possible um and hope that just like any verman or anyone else that we may not have been able to directly individually connect with will understand that they have a chance to be vaccinated very expeditiously here in vermont okay my other question is about medical weights is the state seeing more medical weights would be with more vaccine testing math all of it and how are they handling that you know i have absolutely no knowledge on that except to say that using common sense there has to be more this is a vaccination effort nationwide nevermind statewide that is unparalleled in history so the numbers of gloves the numbers of syringes the numbers of needles the numbers of vials of magical liquid have got to be incredible i would bet some of the people in operations and in facilities management at our major hospitals would have some much more direct insight into that in terms of even pounds and tonnage of waste compared to previous but it has to be more there's no question and then if you just think about our testing enterprise forget about vaccination that requires a tremendous amount of uh PPE testing materials in terms of collections reagent materials in terms of the laboratory etc at volumes that are just unparalleled with anything seen in the past so you've probably opened up a little bit of a door to a door that we may not have wanted to look behind in terms of how our whole environment and society is dealing with that but i do know that you know this is still what you would call medical waste and there are very strict protocols that are adhered to with all of that so i'm sure they're just being challenged by volume not by having to change anything that's been done thank you hey governor i had another question about another another bill going through uh esopan which you're probably familiar with it increases unemployment insurance benefits and the concern from the business community seems to be well two-fold one it it would take some money i suppose from the rescue money up maybe $50 million or so but the bigger concern is that it'll disincentivize people going back to work and especially in those those jobs you've discussed in hospitality etc are you concerned at all that that um the unemployment the extension of the employment on the federal side and perhaps even this bill could actually keep people home instead of getting them back to work when we have you know a labor shortage already well again there's obviously some concern amongst the the business community about this they've spoken loud and clear about what they think should and shouldn't happen and enough so that the i believe that it put a pause on the legislation moving forward and i don't know where it's at right now but you know seeing the chart we have here everyone who wants to be vaccinated uh 16 and over will be able to get signed up by one month from today April 19th and we're well on our way i believe to recovery so as i've said having the opportunity to go back to work and do things in a normal way it just opens up all kinds of opportunity for us more mobility more of a sense of normalcy and in all in all fashions so i'm hopeful that there won't be a need for additional ui in terms of trying to keep people afloat in a lot of respects especially with the $300 that's being added to the weekly benefit today and that goes on for quite some time so um if i thought there was a need right now and they didn't we didn't have the $300 in place from the federal government i might feel differently but i i think the additional $300 at this point in time is getting people through but what we really need to do is get them back to work well i mean that that's that's a big part of it is even the federal extension could uh to incentivize people from you know going back to work because maybe they would even be making more money on or similar money on unemployment benefits which are you know the federal program is going through september so um and the bigger question is there a concern there that we can't bring people back to work well again i i believe that getting people vaccinated getting people more comfortable with getting back to work in the in the normal sense is the key that's the answer and i believe we will have that available to us by 4th of july and as a follow-up to that it looks at the unemployment trust fund the state unemployment trust fund has enough money for about 70 weeks so i assume there's you're probably not concerned about that i i'm i'm not you know i've been i watched that on a weekly basis from the very beginning and it looks like we're out of the woods in that respect i think california had to take out a loan within two months of the pandemic because they were underwater but we we had built up enough capacity we had over a half a billion to begin with and we're down around 200 million at this point so we've made it this far over the last over a year now with what we have and things are only going to get better i believe so we should be well out of the woods in terms of of making sure that we have enough in the trust fund to get us through the the following year and the seasonal approach that we've seen in the past so i'm quite comfortable with that all right great thanks governor governor an estimated third or so of americans have either health philosophical or religious objections to being vaccinated for covid 19 if next month they may be prohibited from eating shopping or going to work how will you respond to their claims that they're being treated unequally like second-class citizens well you know i haven't put forth anything that would preclude them from doing anything that you mentioned so i'm not concerned about that again there may be guidance in place if you haven't been able to get vaccinated or refuse to be vaccinated i know in the healthcare for instance in healthcare there is a provision in some institutions where if you have in the past not wanted to for whatever reason not wanted to get your vaccine for flu for seasonal flu that you have to wear PPE you have to wear a mask and that's been in place for a number of years in certain institutions so if we may get to a point where it's advisable for you to continue to wear a mask in some of those settings but we haven't we haven't contemplating refusing anyone when we're out of this pandemic in fact you know i want to get to a point where we don't have to have the state of emergency at all okay so this wouldn't be so much denying service as you need to wear a mask and social distance and that sort of thing yeah i i'm not contemplating that whatsoever when when we get through this i believe that we'll continue to provide guidance and advice on what you should and shouldn't do and and then it's going to be up to you okay thank you also h 167 the environmental stewardship board bill would give some oversight over the fish and wildlife board you know the hunting and fishing board your thoughts on the necessity and wisdom of adding another board the environmental stewardship board yeah i i am not familiar with that at all guy i think uh what we have in place i don't i don't we have trouble filling all the boards we have now i can't imagine adding another one to that but um but we'll see i i i haven't seen that did they get through crossover no okay so we don't have to worry about it we don't have to worry about this year then right uh i well this is legislature we're talking about i'm not sure but i see your point yeah thank you yeah hi i have a couple questions about the recent moves to relax some of our restrictions specifically i'm thinking of the unvaccinated household gatherings and then the upcoming reopening of bars um given our stubbornly high case counts and the emergence of these more contagious variants can you talk a little bit about the justification for making these moves now instead of waiting until more people are vaccinated knowing that the behavior will inevitably lead to some more transmission well again every decision we make we work as a team and when we rely on the advice of our health experts and we came to the conclusion that this is the right point in time to do this and open it up in a safe manner but we again as i said when you look at one month from today uh you were opening up the last age band and at that point all Vermonters uh 16 and over will have been given the opportunity to be vaccinated so i think we're well on our way and um and i think we we have shown that we've taken a cautious approach it's worked for us and uh we should be able to benefit from it now now we're not like other states like texas and others who have just opened up their economy and done away with all the mass mandates and so forth uh we feel we need to continue to have the mass mandate until we're through the vaccination process but i think uh it keeps us all safe and we feel we feel optimistic about uh and and confident in some of the decisions we've made could you just so i hear you when you say you've been having conversations about this with your health team what is your health team saying that tells you that it's time to make these moves well we wouldn't the data is defined we wouldn't do this unless they said they were okay with it you know we present this we talk as a team and uh they have the opportunity to say we shouldn't be moving forward on this because we have grave concerns and when that happens we don't we don't move forward is there an inherent acceptance here that we can we can deal with a continued um 100 day average case counts to for example jumpstart some of the economy or or help deal with some of the isolation that people are feeling i mean obviously this is a balancing act and there's a lot of competing interests but i think some people are just curious as to why given the case counts are still so high that we would make some of these moves now again um we feel as though our case counts have leveled out and that we're in good shape uh yes thank you very much uh i'm curious about the new port prison outbreak um facility has been in full lockdown for a little over three weeks now the tests are still coming back positive i'm wondering if you're learning anything about the mechanism of spread um you know as to why it's still circulating despite the lockdown why it's crossing between units um and is it possible that some of the most recent cases uh were the time of infection occurred after the facility was put into lockdown going to refer to secretary smith i think we have some theories but nothing substantiated thanks andrew what was uh what is recommended when we have a situation like this is that you cohort and that means you sort of those that are exposed and those that have the disease have the virus we cohort to sort of to through contact tracing to make sure that we seal off sort of any spread among others that aren't associated with those two sort of um populations and up in new port that has been successful uh frankly um the units where we're seeing the positive come out are those isolation units uh where we're seeing positive so i think what we're seeing is exactly what we thought we would uh we were hoping that it would be sort of um less than what it is in terms of theory i think there are two um major theories and their theories um one is that it did come from the outside uh through um through correctional officers and that we're coming into on various shifts and the other theory is that it's being passed uh prisoner inmate to inmate um mouth to mouth through diverted narcotics and diverted drugs uh medicated drugs that they have those are the two working theories could be one or the other or it could be both can you explain the your second theory a little further yeah there's there's um there are some um there are some inmates that get um what are called mat which is um you know for uh for addiction purposes get various drugs in terms of helping them um get through uh the various to wean off uh addiction uh some of those drugs sometimes are diverted and they're not swallowed uh they're kept in the mouth and then they're sold and that that could be one theory i understand uh staying on topic i see according to the doc dashboard there's one in-state uh in maith that's hospitalized is that connected to the newport outbreak it is um and that that individual um has uh no fever uh o2 saturation levels seem to be fine but out of abundance of precaution uh that that that person was moved to newport hospital and um heading south now to the st john's free prison the prison they've been on lockdown and have positive cases um among the staff of at least one case coming back this week what's the status on that facility yeah they have four staff people that are positive i think one came back yesterday but don't quote me on that but they have four right now just just to give you a sense of how many staff system-wide and remember we have over uh 600 staff um we have 11 uh staff members that are positive today um we have 41 inmates system-wide 40 in northern which is the newport prison and one in southern that's been quarantined uh that person was quarantined came into our system was quarantined and was uh was tested positive so remains in quarantine uh as we move forward but um that's what we have system-wide and and you know when we have positives in a facility we lock down the facility sometimes we do a full lockdown sometimes we do a modified lockdown and what we do um what we do uh after that is test and we'll test multiple times a week to make sure that it isn't spreading and and the fact that we we've got this under control and then the lockdowns are lifted from there so is there testing plans for the st john's free facility in light of this yeah this week's that absolute that already been done yeah absolutely that obviously this was picked up on the testing i i believe it was picked up on the testing but it's standard protocol andrew that as soon as we have a positive in a facility we start the immediate protocol for testing which is um pretty pretty aggressive testing over a certain amount of time okay and while you're at the podium secretary smith can you just uh describe a little more your meeting with the esics county officials was that spurred on uh just by the low uptake out there and who did you have on the call with you sort of what were some of the the theories on on why it's the low uptake you know it's i think i had addressed this earlier but it's a big county as man it's a long county north the south and i think and it's a rogue rural county i think there's just a 6000 population there so people are pretty spread out so we have a test we have vaccine clinics in beecher's fault beecher falls um brightened and conquered to the west we have you know a lot of capacity in terms of newport and derby line and the pharmacies on the west on the south we have st johnsbury and pharmacy capability there but it is a drive i mean it's it's 30 to 45 minutes to get to people and some people just feel that they the communications aspect of where these are what how we sort of communicate and get some um gets get people um cognizant of what is going on i i want to say this um it doesn't take that many more people to bring it up to the statewide average it's a small it's a you know the population is fairly um uh small in that in that county so it doesn't take a lot of people to bring it up so what i'm thinking uh what we think and this came right from a local official we're going to put road signs up there um those aot road signs that flash that have various information on where and how you can get a a vaccine i think one of the thoughts was you know make sure that it says free vaccine and where to go um which would be the health department website so those are some of the things we talked about and so that's which suggests that you're you're thinking or hoping that it's perhaps just a messaging issue people aren't aware that uh that the clinics are there and and they should be signing up at this point i i think also um and dr levine brought this up yesterday is we've got to reach out to the health care providers on the new hampshire side as well and make sure that they understand where the clinics are because a lot of people get their health care in new hampshire and and make sure especially in the canaan beach of halls area make sure that they understand when and where the clinics are uh for those so yeah yeah i think it's making people aware making health care providers aware um you know i went through the list of of how many um uh how many vacancies we had within the testing facilities in terms of uh unused slots and you know we have slots up there we just need to bring people to those slots and we need also to make sure that people understand and the health care providers on both sides of the river understand uh the schedule okay thank you i i want to go back um i know we're running late but i want to go back to uh colin from seven days and his question about why i feel or why we feel confident in moving forward and opening up the spigot a bit more and i i missed uh repeating what we say a lot uh in these uh media briefings about our goal our goal from the very beginning was to preserve life and keep people out of the hospital so when you look back we know especially today when we reflect on the 217 people we've lost for monitors we've lost uh 90 percent of them were over 65 and those with chronic conditions as well have been the ones who have been hospitalized hospitalized so we uh we just developed a strategy our age banding strategy to take care of of those who were impacted from loss of life and hospitalization we're just getting through that i mean we're at the tail end of uh and you've heard uh secretary smith talk about the high number of the high percentage of those who have been vaccinated so and you can see from commissure p checks uh modeling showing you know the number of deaths has decreased the hospitalizations have decreased and we're just going to have to get a little bit more accustomed to there's going to be some positive cases it's a fact of life but we're not going to see the hospitalizations we've seen in the past and we're not going to see the deaths we see in the past with the with the vaccine uh that has been implemented the strategy that we've utilized so that's the very foundation of everything that we're doing and now that we're opening up to the next age brackets all Vermonters will have the opportunity by April 19th to sign up to be vaccinated if they choose to be so 16 and over so again that gives us confidence in moving forward opening up the economy and the spicket turns a little bit more regularly and and we'll get back to normal by the 4th of July with that no other question we'll see you all again on Tuesday thank you very much