 few important announcements today, so I'll get right to it. First, I'm happy to announce that beginning this Tuesday, February 16th, we're opening up registration for the vaccine to the next age band, 70 and over. The date over 85% of Vermonters 75 and older have scheduled or already received their vaccinations, which is faster than many other states. Opening in the next age band is an important step, especially with hope on the horizon for increased supply and approval of new vaccines. I also want to reiterate another point once again. As I know, many continue to wonder why other states have broader eligibility than Vermont's. Some of our neighbors, for example, have open to 65 and older in certain job categories as well. But again, just saying people are eligible doesn't mean they actually have the doses to cover them. That's why we've seen other states cancel appointments or have to schedule months in the future, even for those in their 70s, 80s and even 90s. Here in Vermont, we've taken a different approach. We're setting realistic expectations based on the supply. We know we're going to receive so we can do this as efficiently as possible instead of over promising and under delivering. To be blunt, we're just being honest with you. And as you've heard me say many times, we're targeting vaccines to those we know are most likely to die if they get sick. Because the science and data is clear, age puts you at a higher risk for death from COVID-19. And I believe we have a moral obligation to first preserve the lights of those who have taken care of us for decades. And after we begin to move through this next age band, we'll open to 65 plus and then those with certain high risk conditions that lead to worse outcomes from the disease. Secretary Smith will provide more details and further updates on our vaccine rollout in a few minutes. Next this Monday, I'll sign an extension to the state of emergency for another month. As a reminder, this is simply the tool we need to respond to the pandemic. But to be honest, I'm hopeful there won't be too many more of these extensions in the future. As we vaccinate more Vermonters, particularly those vulnerable to severe illness or death if they get sick, will begin to again turn the spigot once more and get back to whatever normal will be. This goes hand in hand with some good news we've heard about vaccine supply, including increased production from Pfizer, as well as the emergency approval of Johnson and Johnson likely to happen in the coming weeks. I was happy to hear Dr. Fauci say yesterday that by April, he believes the general population could begin to have broad access to the vaccines. This is tremendously good news. Finally, last week we announced a return of certain school sports competition because we know how important it is for our kids. Today we have some more good news. Secretary French will talk about resuming music programs, which we know are also essential to the mental health and well being of Vermont's kids. Now, just like athletics and really everything that's been reopened since the start of the pandemic, this will not look like it used to, but it's a step in the right direction and will be good for our youth. I also want to be clear we make each of these decisions in close consultation with Dr. Levine and his team of experts at the Department of Health and also with our education and mental health experts because the fact is denying kids the activities they love is causing them real harm. Some have spent almost a year with little or no contact with their friends and no sense of normalcy in their routines. We can't ignore the impact this has had on them and as we've heard from pediatricians, they're not okay and we shouldn't be okay with that either. So when my public health experts tell me they're comfortable giving kids a chance to do some normal activities with mitigation measures in place to limit risk, then I'm going to do it because our kids are in need and doing what's best for them as a goal I know many of us share. So with that, I'll turn it over to Secretary French for more details. Secretary French. Thank you, Governor. Good morning. I'll begin my update by reviewing the surveillance testing results of school staff for the last two weeks. As I mentioned last week, the testing for the week of January 31st was disrupted somewhat by the snowstorm on that Tuesday. The participation rate was lower, probably as a result of scheduling challenges related to the storm. We typically see a participation rate of about 40% in the voluntary testing, but for the week of the 31st, the participation rate was 27%, about 1,600 tests. Testing did identify two cases of COVID-19, which translates to a positivity rate of about 0.12%. This week, the participation rate was 33% and four cases were identified. Positivity rate 0.35%. The positivity rate from the surveillance testing of school staff has increased over the last few weeks, but still remains significantly lower than the state positivity rate, which is currently 1.8%. The two cases identified through the surveillance testing for the week of January 31st were in Rutland and Franklin counties. The four cases from this week were all in Franklin County. There is more virus activity in these counties as compared to most other areas of the state, so the surveillance testing data can be seen as confirmation of the larger patterns of the virus that we're seeing across the state. Unfortunately, the rising counts in Franklin County are likely to have an impact on school operations in the coming days. Superintendent for the districts in the Richard area alerted me last night that some of the schools will be moving to remote instruction in the next couple of days. I would like to remind everyone that there's a direct connection between the cases of the virus in our communities and the cases in our schools. Please follow the state guidelines, including wearing a mask so we can keep our schools open. We had a very productive meeting on music this week. As the governor mentioned, we'll be moving forward with publishing guidance next week to permit more music in our schools. As in the case with most of our school activities, it will not be music as normal, but with some restrictions. These restrictions include the following. All performers will be required to have a six by six foot distance around them when performing at all times. And for trombones, the distance requirement will be six by nine feet. When playing woodwind and brass instrumentalists will use masks that have a small slit for the mouthpiece center. And when they're not playing, a non slitted mask will be worn over the slitted mask. Woodwind and brass instruments will be required to have a multi-layer bell cover with a middle layer consisting of a Murr 13 filter material. The air in rehearsal spaces will need to have three complete exchanges per hour. Rehearsals will be limited to 30 minutes in length and no audience will be permitted during performances. Currently, the guidance for music is embedded in our larger state school's guidance. To enact these new changes will be publishing standalone guidance and music that will supersede and replace the current guidance. This approach will be helpful in making changes to the music guidance as we have more experience with this implementation. Also, our new music guidance is based on the work that is happening at the national level through the National Federation of State High School Associations or NSHS. We have learned that other states are in the process of revisiting their music guidance based on the evolving work of NSHS. So it's going to be useful to have standalone music guidance to incorporate recommendations that might be coming down from the national level in the future. I want to thank the leaders of the Vermont Music Educators Association for their work and pulling together the various resources for us to evaluate over the last several months. And I'd also like to thank Drs Raston Lee from UVM who continue to be very, very generous with their time in supporting the development of our school guidance. I mentioned previously that music has been one of the more challenging areas for us in terms of developing guidance. Some of our restrictions indicate there's a lot involved in music. Instruments function differently from an aerosol production perspective. For example, flutes are much more safe than oboes. The mitigation measures for music are therefore relatively complex. The proposed mitigation measures have not changed much however from what we considered earlier in a fall. But what has changed is our confidence level and the ability of schools to implement these complex measures with fidelity. Back then schools were still getting familiar with the basic mitigation measures to operate schools safely. We wanted to ensure schools could do that before moving on to more complex guidance areas. We looked at music again in early October when we moved schools to step three in our guidance based on their demonstrated ability to operate safely. Shortly there after however, the case count started to rise again with the holiday period upon us. We are uncomfortable moving forward with music. The situation is now different. We have made it through the holidays and although case counts in Vermont remain elevated as compared to the pre holiday period, schools continue to demonstrate their ability to operate safely. The big difference now is that we can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak, with conditions likely to improve in the coming weeks with the advent of warmer weather and the vaccine making more impact. But a consideration of the cumulative negative impact of this emergency on the well-being of our students is starting to weigh more in on our decision making. We are confident our schools can manage the risk of music activities, but we also acknowledge that every day that goes by when our students are not in school brings risk as well. Music is essential for the well-being and academic success of our students. In the coming weeks, we'll look at other areas of our guidance such as the performing arts and theater and do a similar evaluation. As we contemplate moving into a recovery phase in education, enabling these types of activities will become a key strategy in addressing the social emotional needs of our students and will go a long way in restoring a sense of normalcy in their lives. I think Vermont has a special responsibility to try to do more for our students since our pandemic response to date has been arguably one of the best in the world. In the early phases of the pandemic, Vermont benefited greatly from the hard lessons learned from other countries and states that were more adversely impacted by the virus. It's now our turn, our responsibility, to show others how to recover from the pandemic and to restore normalcy in the lives of our students by returning to more in-person education and in-person activities like music and the arts. That concludes my update. I'll now turn it over to Secretary Smith. Thank you, Secretary French. Good morning, everyone. As Governor Scott mentioned, we have some very good news to report. Starting next week, we are opening up registration of a new age group. This will mark the beginning of phase three of our vaccination program. On Tuesday, February 16th, Vermont is 70 years old and above will be able to register to receive their COVID-19 vaccination. Registration for this group will begin at 8.15 a.m. on Tuesday. There are two ways you can register. First, you can go online at healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine or you can call our Vaccine Call Center at 855-722-7878. Both will be open at 8.15 on Tuesday. Our vaccine center is open actually seven days a week. 8.15 to 5.30 p.m. on weekdays and 10 to three on weekends. We would urge you to use the online registration system while recognizing that some may prefer calling. If you want to make an appointment online through our state operated community vaccine program, there are two steps involved. The first step is to create an account online at healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine. This can be done at any point in time even today. You do not have to wait for your age group to become available to set up an account. The second step is to make your appointment starting on Tuesday at 8.15 a.m. Remember, you must be in the current eligibility group of 70 and above to make an appointment. And again, if you're not able to schedule an appointment online, you can still contact our Vaccine Call Center at 855-722-7878. As a reminder, healthcare workers in group 1A will continue to be eligible to receive the vaccine. Hospitals will receive ongoing allocations of the vaccine for the purposes of vaccinating this group. Eligible individuals in group 1A should contact the hospital in their area to make an appointment. I know I'm going to be repeating some information, but this is a new group and a new age group and I want to make sure everyone is prepared. If you are 70 and above, here's the information you will need when you make an appointment online or by phone. You will be asked your name, birth date, address, phone number, and email if you have one. You will be asked to verify your residency in Vermont. If you are not 75 years old or older and a Vermont resident, you should not register. You will be asked to answer a series of health questions that are important to know for the vaccination process. You will be asked for insurance information, so have it handy. But you do not have to have insurance or if you do not want to, if you do not have insurance or you do not wish to give your insurance information, you can still register. Again, it will be helpful to have your card handy for your primary insurance. Once you finished answering this question, you will be asked to select a vaccine clinic site. We urge you to select the nearest vaccination site to your home. We have calculated where 75-year-olds live and distributed the vaccine in accordance to that distribution. Once you selected the site, you should select the date and time from the menu of options available. After you make your appointment online, you will get an automatic verification letter sent to you in your email. If you have an appointment over the phone, you will collect, we will collect a phone number and email address if you have one so that you can, we can issue you a verification. A short video about the registration process and other helpful information is available at healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine. Appointments are available at clinics statewide. Here's what you can expect when you arrive at your appointment. Please arrive on time for your appointment. Once you arrive at your location, you will be asked for your name and date of birth. You will be asked to sign a vaccine administration waiver consenting to receive the shot. Then you will be vaccinated. We ask you to stay at the site for about 15 minutes so that you can be monitored for any immediate reactions to the injection. We will also get you scheduled for your second dose appointment while you are at the clinic so you, so that you leave with that appointment in hand. Again, we cannot accommodate walk-ins. Please be sure you register in advance and arrive on your scheduled day and time. As we move forward through the additional groups, anyone who has previously been eligible will continue to be eligible. That means if you are in the 75 and over age group that we started with, you will continue to be eligible with the 70 and above age group. As I mentioned on Tuesday, Walgreens will participate in the federal pharmacy program and we will receive vaccine distribution directly from the federal government above and beyond our state allocation. They received 2,000 doses and they have 20 locations across the state with four locations in southern Vermont. Those locations in southern Vermont are Bennington, Brattleboro, Bellas Falls and Manchester. They are starting clinics today for Vermonters 75 and older. On Tuesday, they will schedule clinics for those 70 and older. To make your appointment at Walgreens, you can access the link at healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine or go directly to the Walgreens website at Walgreens.com. We will issue a press release after today's briefing. As of today, nearly 70,000 eligible Vermonters have been vaccinated against COVID-19. 30,200 Vermonters received their first dose and 32,600 have received their second dose. 33,552 Vermonters, age 75 and older, have made an appointment for their first dose through our vaccination program. So far, 38% of Vermonters in the 75-year-old and above-age group as well as 538 homebound Vermonters have received their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine. This week, we are adding agencies helping us to administer vaccines to the homebound individuals. And these will include Addison County Home Health, Central Vermont Home Health, UVM Home Health and Hospice, Waterbury EMS, which will be helping and vaccinating in Lemoyle County, Garnett EMS which will be doing Chittin and Grand Isle Counties, and Newport EMS. The next phase includes vaccinating homebound members, community members who do not utilize home health services. We anticipate this phase to begin next week and we'll have further details at that time. Health clinics coming on board next week include Copley Hospital in Lemoyle County, Gifford Medical Center in Orange County, and North Country Hospital in Orleans County. All will start vaccinating Vermonters 70-years-old and older. Phase 3 with an age grouping of 70-years-old and older is the smallest of the age group we have identified for priority vaccinations with approximately 33,200 Vermonters. We should be able to register and schedule and ultimately vaccinate this age group relatively quickly before moving on to those 65 years, Vermonters 65-years and older in which will be called Phase 4. After that we'll move into Phase 5 that encompasses those ages 16 to 64 with high-risk conditions. Dr. Levine has mentioned previously some of those high-risk conditions. Vaccinating Vermonters who are at the highest risk first allow us as the governor mentioned to minimize death and hospitalization. And as the governor has previously mentioned, we are now discussing and planning for Phase 6. Of course, all of our future planning is contingent on the supply of a vaccine from the federal government, but so far we have seen a consistent supply come in through the last few weeks. I will now turn to Dr. Levine who will give an help update. Thank you. Just have a few slides to go through to sort of set the table for the rest of the presentation. Total cases now at 13,415 deaths at 189. I would like to comment though that the again pace of the additional deaths has slowed considerably from where it had been. I show this slide mainly to show there's been quite a bit of fluctuation with regard to daily case counts in Vermont. We were in double digits for several days. We're now at 162 for the most recent day. The importance of this slide is that no matter what our case count on an individual day, you can see by the very light blue bars that our testing itself is quite exuberant. And we have abundant testing almost every day of the week. Letting us arrive at a positivity rate in the 1.6 to 1.7% range pretty consistently at this time. At this time of year, we would normally see a tremendous amount of influenza. We would see on this slide of percent of emerging care visits for symptoms related to diseases like COVID and influenza, a tremendous amount of activity. As you can see in the right part of the graph, there's very little of that at this time. Quite remarkable. And I'm showing this slide now as I'll be discussing it a little later. This is the outbreaks in long-term care facilities. The reason for the slide is not the names of the facilities. It is the small number of the facilities. It's not the numbers of cases, but it's the fact that, cumulatively, there are very few cases. So just keep that in the back of your mind as we discuss it later on. The only thing I haven't shown you is that hospitalizations have slightly decreased to 47 as has ICU bed occupancy which is down to 11. Now as you know, some of the reason for our case counts has to do with the fact that we have been seeing rising cases in three counties, Bennington, Rutland, and Franklin. And I can share a few points. In the past two weeks, Bennington County reported 244 cases with 51 associated with active outbreaks. Realized just from that ratio that active outbreaks are not the main driving force for the activity in Bennington County nor in the other counties I'll discuss. This is a sign that there is significant community transmission of virus occurring. We were seeing increases in multiple towns in the county for the past several weeks, but this week, only one town was flagged by our teams. So to me, this indicates some improvement, but it's a little early to be certain yet. For Rutland County in the past two weeks, there were 306 cases reported of which 83 were associated with active outbreaks. The area still continues to see high rates of COVID-19, but only a few towns have been noted by our teams as seeing an increase. And finally, with regard to Franklin County in the past two weeks, they have reported 244 cases. There are 68 cases associated with active outbreaks. Several towns have seen increases, many of them due to household transmission and community transmission. We are very hopeful that we have provided a fair amount of communication, messaging, discussions with local officials and access to testing, as you'll hear in Franklin County. That one, unlike Bennington and Rutland, who are now on the downslope, is actively increasing but at a much lower absolute number. The goal is to really nip that in the bud through active compliance of the part of the population with public health guidance and increase in testing so that containment can be carried out. So my message to Vermonters in these areas is we need you to do your part to change this trajectory. If you're not consistently wearing a mask or keeping your distance, if you're gathering with people you don't live with, if you're traveling, you may not only be contributing to the spread of the virus but also holding us all back from the future we're working towards. That time when we have fewer COVID cases and deaths, less illness and hospitalizations when we can start taking steps toward our previous ways of life. In addition to consistently and conscientiously taking these everyday actions to prevent COVID-19, masks, physical distancing and avoiding crowds, I again ask Vermonters in these areas to get tested. The sooner you know you're positive, the sooner you can take steps to protect yourself and others. And there are more testing opportunities available. For instance in Rutland County in the coming days at Rutland Regional Medical Center. In Bennington County I mentioned on Tuesday new testing options in Manchester and there's also testing opening in Stratton. I would like to thank Bromley Resort, Stratton Mountain and the town of Manchester for partnering with health and expanding testing opportunities in Bennington County. And there are plenty of open appointments in Franklin County in Swanton, Enesburg, Fairfax in addition to testing available in St. Albans at Kinney Drugs. Moving to another topic, we have heard a lot about variants of the virus across the country that may cause the virus to spread more quickly. And as we announced yesterday, we now have some evidence that there's likely a variant of concern here in Vermont. Through wastewater testing, the city of Burlington detected the presence of two COVID-19 virus mutations that are associated with the B117 mutant or variant which was first discovered in the United Kingdom. This is a strong indicator that the virus is probably present in the community. We still need to confirm the presence of the variant through genetic sequencing of individual samples from people who may have had positive tests or COVID-19. Mutations and variants are expected over time. The reason the B117 variant is concerning is because it is thought to be more transmissible and could lead to more cases of COVID-19 as well as potentially increased hospitalizations and deaths. It's been found at 34 states now and I've said many times we do expect it to find it in Vermont as well. However, learning this news doesn't really mean we have to change anything we do. We just need to do it all the better. Always wear that mask when you are outside your household. Keep at least a 6-foot distance and avoid any place that looks even remotely crowded. And the CDC has just come out with some new research about so-called double masking which I've spoken about here. It found that wearing a cloth mask over a surgical mask offers more protection against the coronavirus as does tying knots on the ear loops of the surgical masks so-called knotted and tucked masks. I realized that these were experiments in a physical chemistry lab and that they were not done with sick people coughing or breathing on well people and recording how well illness was prevented. But the simple and compelling conclusion was that a good fit of the mask increases how well the mask might protect. I want to emphasize this is not something that we all need to do. The most important thing is we just need to wear a mask, period. But if you are concerned about the fit of your mask or want that additional degree of protection from a tighter fit, it may be worth trying especially if the new enemy is a more transmissible virus variant. On another CDC related update they've just released new guidance for people who have been fully vaccinated but are exposed to someone with COVID-19. The CDC now says that these people do not need to quarantine so long as they are fully vaccinated meaning at least two weeks has passed since their second dose of the current vaccines. They're within three months following the receipt of their last dose of the vaccine and they have no symptoms since the current exposure. So this means that if you fit these criteria meaning first and foremost that you've actually been vaccinated and you come into contact with a COVID-positive person you no longer need to quarantine. There's an exception however for vaccinated inpatients and residents in healthcare settings like long term care for settings they still need to quarantine. I can share today that Vermont will follow this new guidance about quarantine. This is really great news and shows we believe vaccination not only protects you from getting infected in those 90 days but also that you won't be able to spread the virus either. As you know quarantine is also currently required for travel. We are not yet making any changes to travel related quarantine for fully vaccinated people but we are being very thoughtful about it and exploring its impact. We hope to have more to say about it next week. Keep in mind the CDC just came out with its new guidance about 36 hours ago. Now you've already heard from Secretary Smith that we're expanding our vaccine eligibility to people 70 and older starting on Tuesday. We're glad to be able to offer the vaccine to more Vermonters and I know how eager many of you will be to make your appointment. I just want to reiterate to everyone we appreciate your patience with the process. We expect high call volumes on Tuesday but there will be enough appointments for everyone. Please do not call to make your appointment before Tuesday because you won't be able to. If you plan to make your appointment online however I want to repeat that you can prepare ahead of time by creating an account in our online system. This will help you get a step ahead so you can easily log in on Tuesday to schedule your appointment. You can also find answers to your questions watch a video and learn tips for making your appointment. Visit healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine for my for more information. I also want Vermonters age 75 and older to know that there are still plenty of appointments available around the state. So if you haven't made an appointment yet please call us go online or ask a friend or family member to help you. We especially encourage those who are eligible in Rutland, Franklin and Bennington counties where we're seeing increased spread so they may protect themselves by getting vaccinated. On another vaccine related note we continue to see success in vaccinating residents in our long-term care facilities. Remember the slide I showed earlier. We're seeing markedly fewer cases and outbreaks and deaths at these facilities coincident with our very aggressive testing and admission protocols and the strong work of our outbreak prevention response teams but also while the pace of vaccination in these facilities has really accelerated. I might add this is a phenomenon that's being noted around the country now and shows the true success of this vaccination strategy. Over 90% of residents in Vermont's skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities and residential care homes have received at least their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Clinics are ongoing but so far almost two-thirds of residents have received their second dose. This will help us to prepare for how we help these facilities loosen some of the restrictions and allow residents to interact safely with each other and their loved ones. We know how important this is to their health and well-being and we'll have more to say on this in a future press conference. Finally, I understand many schools have vacation coming up some as soon as next week. So I just want to acknowledge to all of the parents out there it may not be a vacation for you. We're all tired. These days off school may put actually extra strain on your family especially when parents are working from home. Unfortunately we still are somewhat limited in some of our activities right now. So please try and avoid those indoor get-togethers and sleepovers. But with masks six-foot spaces we can get outside enjoy some of the snow with others very safely. Try to keep your connections with friends and family strong and reach out for support when you need it. I'll turn it back to the governor now. Thank you Dr. Levine. We'll now open it up to questions. Thank you governor. So probably a question for Dr. Levine. So Dr. Levine getting back to the guidance that came out from the CDC about having your being fully vaccinated for more than two weeks but less than three months. What does this tell us about the efficacy of the vaccine after three months and it's whether it's effective in the long term. Thanks for asking that question because I want to be very clear about this. The CDC is being appropriately cautious but I don't want that to be viewed in a pessimistic way because the reality is they're waiting for more data because all of the people in the vaccine trials continue to be followed over time and they recognize and have even told the population that by March we expect one of the mutants the variant strains the UK one to perhaps become the dominant strain in the country. So they didn't want to jump the gun too quickly and go beyond the 90 days not knowing exactly how that might play out with the variant strain. However I believe and I have good knowledge to be able to say this that they were planning on 180 days originally and just because of cautions about this topic I just brought up they held it to 90 it's obviously something that they can easily extend once they have more data and see the impact but it has nothing to do with belief that the vaccine is not going to be durable during that time here. Then probably a question for Secretary Smith as well. You know it appears that we're getting a more or beginning to have a more steady and predictable stream of the vaccine coming through. So I'm wondering you know if you're anticipating the time frame that we get through 70 plus 65 plus age bands if you're anticipating that to speed up and if so if we're going to have to rebook appointments for for some for monitors. Well of course it could always speed up depending on the vaccine but we have planned that we would be done with the 65 plus when we we said you know between somewhere in the second week of March in the last week of March I think we're still on that time schedule. I think in the beginning of March you'll start seeing a switch to the next age band which is the 65 plus given the size of this age band and given what we've seen in terms of the predictability of the vaccine coming in and our ability to sort of get it out the door. So I think we're on the original time frame that I had mentioned before if not a little faster than I had mentioned before but I would expect you know in several weeks we'll be announcing another band that will be opening. Just a quick follow-up to that you mentioned phase 6 which is going to be the phase after 18 to 65 with underlying conditions I guess can you just kind of elaborate on what that age band or what that priority schedule I think the governor had mentioned in previous press conferences and I'll just reiterate we're looking at that now we we you know we're looking at the various options that that what that would look like in phase 6 we don't have any sort of predetermined view of that right now but we are talking about it extensively. In response to your first question Calvin I think this really does highlight the beauty of the way we're doing this. Other states as you mentioned with the increase supply coming into their states and they've they've already made their reservations appointments months in advance they are going to have to be forced with either moving them up rescheduling bringing other people to the front of the line so to speak after others have made their appointments and with us doing it the way we're doing it it's and we're contemplating a three week supply that they've continued to advocate for on the federal level giving us that continuity this gives us the option of speeding that up right so so if we get through the next banding this 70 and over banding which is smaller in a matter of three weeks then we'll know what our next supply is going to be and we'll be able to increase the number of appointments so again it just signifies I think we're doing this right and I think it'll be more seamless than other states who have opened up to this broad broad category and this is more realistic and we'll get us there faster so I think that's why we did what we've done in regards to that and as well as to just a fairness standpoint and making sure we take care of those who are implications as well as death as a result so and in the other the sixth I think Secretary Smith said it right we are just contemplating all kinds of options we may continue to do just the age banding but we may do something else we're just considering that as we speak Governor the the senate it was introduced into the senate anyway the bill extending sports betting in the state of Vermont but how do you feel about that with the money I believe the money is going to the general fund not necessarily to you know to education or something but as you might recall in the last I don't remember which year it was over the last four years we've actually promoted that and advocated for that so suffice it to say that my opinion hasn't changed I think we should allow that and where it goes will be determined but we have a lot of need in some respects getting this on the table is good news and since you are in favor of that who are you betting on for the Daytona 500 I'm not betting on it we're going to have the sports betting at this point in time but I have my I have my favorites and that would be a number of different drivers and we have a lot of connections you know in terms of Vermonters being part of the NASCAR teams in fact my godson is a crew chief on one of the 42 car so that will be on the top of the list for me long shot okay thank you yes good morning continuing with the non vaccine related thread here Governor you made a little cameo yesterday on the floor of the U.S. Senate what did you think and would you advise the Senate to convict you know I've been very clear over the last four or five years my feelings haven't changed on on our former president a character in integrity matter to me and continue to but I feel again we all have a responsibility as leaders to lead with integrity and I think words do matter and what the president has done he put his ego in himself before the country and I think that that is dangerous to our way of life our constitution our country and I think that again words matter the truth matters honesty matters and I think the Senate should contemplate all of the above but the House managers did a good job presenting the case and I think it's quite clear that they they have to do the right thing they have to impeach the president because we don't we're condoning this action and it will replicate in the future and that's the most dangerous part it's not about as much about President Trump as it is about the president to do I guarantee it will be done again in the future and it will undermine our country our way of life and our constitution secondly what was your reaction to the remark Commissioner Shirling made and apologized for well again I think Commissioner Shirling did the right thing and apologizing obviously this was offensive to many and we all learned from this and I think this is a moment to learn about that words do matter again learning finding out the meaning of it the root of the the word itself was something all of us should reflect on but I think he did the right thing and he didn't his intention wasn't to hurt anyone and so I think he did he did the right thing thank you the Bennington banner thank you hello thank you my question is the Tecanonic and Green Regional School District here in Manchester sent a letter to Secretary French and the Commissioner Levine with regards to prioritizing teachers to receive the vaccine when supply becomes available in Vermont saying that it would help us to make it possible for students to return in person in April wondered if you have received that letter either of you gentlemen and what your reaction is to that request Secretary French yes thank you yes I will I will serve that's my former school district so I always enjoy hearing from them and I appreciate their advocacy I did respond and merely said that thank you very much I appreciate your advocacy but as we've been fairly clear our strategy for vaccination is really determined right now on the limited supply and that will no doubt our strategy will no doubt evolve as the supply increases okay thank you go to Joe Barton Chronicle to your outline of the proposed changes I noticed that singing wasn't included although you referred to further changes to come in performing arts am I to assume that that's where whatever you decide to do to allow or continue to band singing together will come thanks for the question those singing will be included in the music guidance that we'll be issuing next week we'll look at performing arts such as there in the future but singing is included in the music guidance thank you and one other question this is a general question getting wrong towards a month since the change in administration and I'm curious has that meant a change one way or another in the state's relationship with the federal government as far as the ability of vaccine well again Joe as I mentioned I think on Tuesday we have seen an increase in supply I don't know whether we would have seen that increase in supply regardless of the administration but we're in a pretty good spot I do enjoy having the conversations on a weekly basis which we had regularly that was very good about his time and provided for the National Governors Association to have those meetings so this is not a real change other than this is every single week and they give us some sense of what they're going to do over the next three weeks so they're guaranteeing us a supply over the next three weeks which we didn't have before now again if the people could enjoy that today okay thank you thank you I'm wondering how soon would people in that age group 70 and older be able to get an appointment will those be starting next week do you think it's my understanding that yes that could start there be slots open sometime next week so yes okay and then I had a question for the communication that might show the variant how long does that testing of the health department doing how long does that usually take so the genome sequencing yes takes about a week okay so we won't have we won't have information on that until next week we send that out right now that's being done we're going to answer it with their public health lab but we're rapidly working on trying to gain additional capacity here at UVM and with our state public health lab okay and had the health department started some of that testing previously on other specimens yes so I announced on Tuesday negative for the variant oh okay okay thank you thank you very much yeah and we do have a sort of set of criteria that we use for determining how to sample specimens across the state and really try to prioritize them so we could get the highest yield needless to say we've added an additional criterion based on what just happened this week and that is analysis thank you I see thank you I have a couple of questions for Mike Smith but first of all Governor it would be nice to see Ryan get that that victory this year after that terrible activity at the end of the race last year but for Mike Smith there you know I was wondering I saw the notice the tweet this morning about trying to get people who are 75 plus to get the reason why we're moving so fast to the next phase because the percent of 75 plus is not as high as we were expecting and maybe perhaps not as high as you would like it to be I think we're actually have a very high turnout in the 75 plus but Secretary Smith Tim I think we'll get the analysis on what we're seeing on this you know we had about that age group is about 49,000 of course you got to subtract those that have already gotten the vaccine because many of them are in long-term care facilities as well and actually there are a few that are in group 1A as well so you subtract that out you subtract out you know what you think will not be taking part based upon what we've seen in long-term care facilities that have been taking and I think we're pretty much right on where we had anticipated there still will be what we saw in 1A is that we saw people sort of hold back a little bit and then come forward but you know we've got 33,000 people signed up I think by the end of it we'll probably you know be in high 30s and that's where we anticipated this would be the other we need to be more meaningful coming from you but I know someone who was 75 plus who went over to ethics to get vaccinated and they asked for a photo ID and luckily they had actually a driver's license with them maybe you can clarify whether people need a photo ID or not when they go to get vaccinated they don't we're not requiring we'll make sure that the message gets out to our healthcare partners as well we what we are requiring is that they attest to their age and their residency when they sign up but what we have found in many cases in this population a lot of people don't have driver's license in this population so asking them for a driver's license may be burdensome also you want a driver's license and less administrative role for this population when they come to be vaccinated so let me look into that a little bit Tim thank you secretary 22 can you hear me I can so US attorney Christina Nolan asked to resign from her position as part of the transition just wondering if you had any sort of broad thoughts some of the qualities that you would be looking for in the next US attorney and if you have any sort of early recommendations on your mind yeah it's unfortunate this is part of politics and there's a new administration coming in and it's not as though this is unfounded it happens it's happened in previous administration but I have a great deal of respect and admiration for Christina Nolan it's a terrific job as US attorney it would be be my hope that she would have been reappointed because she's exactly what we need she's she's not bias she's objective and she does her job very well so the qualities I would look for just same qualities that Christina Nolan and does have but I'm not in I'm not going to be the one making thank you hi thanks for taking my call I have a couple of hospitality um questions probably for Secretary Curley local ins and wedding venues are concerned that they may leave an entire second season of weddings and events they've asked for better state guidelines and metrics to help them know if contracted events that they scheduled last June can take place this June in addition to events that are being held in the community and so thank you for the question Lisa absolutely our team is working on how to help the industry understand what the what the realm of possibilities might be for the summer a lot of exciting news coming out right now our vaccines are obviously going a little faster and the vaccine and that you don't have to quarantine if you've been exposed if you've had your vaccine so there's a lot of good movement here and hopefully these things will help us figure out more quickly what we can imagine for the summer but we're incredibly sensitive and understanding of the how to answer those questions just a quick follow-up to receive the go ahead in May is not sufficient time for them to be able to plan do you have a more concrete timeframe for when they might receive metrics and guidance that I mean again hopefully in the next couple of weeks we can at least give them an update that will give a better feel for that again so much is happening right now and I wouldn't want to absolutely working on that and we recognize that their events plan even in as early as May that are that are hanging in the balance right now with a decision on what they might again imagine possible great and then my second house question is from a restaurant owner who wants to know if the state will be changing its restaurant guidelines so that people who are pod together can dine together she points out yeah I hear from restaurant owners that are trying to navigate that and we really do appreciate the folks that are the restaurant owners that are holding that back right now again we hope to have a lot of changing very quickly and we hope to have some good news in the coming coming weeks but again at the moment would really ask that restaurant owners adhere to that request that diners are open thanks very much for your time you bet yes good afternoon we're hearing from veterans groups we're wondering when they might be open and if there's any funding available to make up for the loss of revenue when they've been open off and on during the past 12 months or so the bell seats are coming in and they still continue to help people to add to this, but they're in with the mix of all the different enterprises, all the different sectors who are wondering when are they going to get back to normal? And this is something we talk about every single day. As you've seen over the last couple of weeks, even after over the last week, there's been a tremendous change. Some good news from the CDC. I expect we'll have more. We're seeing more vaccine supply than we anticipated. There is there is going to be, we believe, another manufacturer, Johnson & Johnson, that may get approved by the end of the month. This could really make a huge difference to the way we do things and how we approach the reopening. Every week, we're trying to define something more that we're comfortable with. We base it on the science and the data. And this week, it was, or last week, it was sports. This week, it's music and and and and other enterprises, you know, the other things that we can do, I believe, to open up safely. So we are as anxious as everyone else and but we'll do it in a manner that's safe for everyone to but but we're seeing again some dramatic increases in a lot of areas that are that are good. It's good news, actually. Good news for us here in Vermont. Secretary Curley. Or yes, Governor, we'll be updating some guidance this afternoon to clarify that clubs may may utilize their faith or things that are permissible under current guidance. So for example, we have some clubs that are looking to offer blood drive. We have some that are vaccination sites. Some have the ability in our license to actually operate as a restaurant. Some like to offer to operate consistently with our indoor entertainment. So for example, you could put single there. But again, anything that is offered in those clubs must be able to follow some of our guidance, any portion of our guidance that's on our website currently and entirely. And it has to be done with a straight face. What we don't want is for social events to be happening at these clubs right now, because we're not ready to again permit that that should be happening. We had too much transmission and community transmission. And it's something we're still holding tight on. But to the extent people can clubs can offer something that is allowed in our guidance currently and follow it to the scene, we are encouraging them to do that. Okay, thank you. Mike Donahue, the Islander. Thanks. Thanks, Rebecca. Governor yesterday, Veronica Lewis pleaded guilty in state court to attempted murder for shooting Darrell, one of you, Westford man three times. And he she she pled guilty earlier this week in federal court to felony felony charges, coming from that same shooting. That case sparked a lot of controversy because you had asked DJ Donovan to and Sarah George initially dropped that case and three others. I mean, she couldn't win the case because insanity defense of being used. You asked DJ Donovan take another look, he filed charges, the federal government filed charges. So now both state and federal prosecutors have obtained criminal convictions on cases that Sarah George said she couldn't win. Somebody asked you last week and you said you hadn't been briefed on on the details but now both cases have happened. As governor, in the person ultimately responsible for public safety in Vermont, with your reaction to those convictions, specifically, if you can reflect back to state's attorney, George's criticism, you had asked for a second opinion. Yeah, I guess, from my perspective, this is good news. It's something that I'd advocated for. As you mentioned, I'd asked the Attorney General, DJ Donovan to take another look and he did, thankfully. And I believe there's been two out of the three cases that he has had an impact on. So I'm appreciative of that. I also want to acknowledge that US Attorney Nolan, as well, moved forward on with a federal prosecution and was successful there. And I know you mentioned that, but she deserves a lot of credit. So I'm not sure we have not heard at this point from the victim to obtain whether he feels this has been justified from his standpoint. I know that must be difficult. But but again, this is I believe if you add it up, and it still isn't finalized, but if you add up the six years minimum on federal charges, as well as the 10 years minimum on the state charges, that's 16 years. So I think it's good news. I do think those are confirmed. They're running together. So if maybe only 10 years will be on supervision for 40, but Yeah, maybe I missed that. I thought it was in addition to but you may be right. Okay, another question is, we got several questions from across Vermont in recent weeks related to the VA Hospital and play River Junction. Apparently, they're getting a large number of vaccines and have been providing shots for people 65 and up, not just 75 and up, but any veterans 65 and up. And one veteran called this week to say, like he called the VA on Tuesday was told, you know, he could come in Wednesday for his shot. He arrived and he talked about how streamlined the process was, they do them in groups of six. Apparently, they're having a walk in clinic, he tells me tomorrow that any veteran 65 and up can go in and get their shots. I mean, what can the state learn from the VA? I mean, it's a stadium communicating. I haven't heard much from during these sessions about the VA what they're offering. And you know, are there clinics and vaccines impacting the Vermont numbers that you might not be aware that for monitors are getting vaccines there and your numbers may be off. I wasn't aware that it was the 65 and over category at the VA. I knew that they were administering some of the vaccinations. But I'll let Secretary Smith answer. Mike, you said over 65 and a veteran. That's interesting to me. That's what I'm told. The person who was ineligible in Vermont was not in the 75, but he clearly is over 65. Mike, I'm kind of joking because I'm in that category. I didn't think you'd hit 50 yet, sir. I know that they were vaccinating veterans. I know you have to be a veteran to be vaccinated in that. I didn't know the age bands. I know that they started with World War II veterans. And we have been in communication with the VA. I think at some point, you know, we want to partner with the VA. But, you know, we they're what you're telling me in terms of how efficient they are, is what I'm hearing back about our operations, both at the hospital partner level and at the health department's pods as well. So let me look into that. That's a good suggestion. But we have been in contact with them in terms of what we can do to partner with one another. And I think I'll hold off in terms of my vaccination until the state of Vermont tells me when it's ready to go. Well, it sounds like they're having a clinic. It sounds like you might think that's a bottom up now. You're telling me. Thanks, Mike. Thank you, everybody. Yeah, Mike, if I could just add to that, the bottom line is we want all Vermonters to get their vaccinations. And if the VA is able to do veterans, and they're doing it like it sounds as though they might be doing it in an age banding fashion, maybe they're just getting through the categories. And so they'll be moving to another age band as well. I know they have reached out. I've spoken to the CEO at the Veterans Administration, and he has offered to help and we've put that into the mix. So we'll be leaning on them in the future. And if they can get through all their veterans, that only helps us here in Vermont as well. Right. Thank you. Thank you, Governor. Appreciate it. Have a good weekend. Thank you, Rebecca. And Governor, good afternoon, Secretary Smith and staff. Just a quick follow up on that. Secretary Smith, you said that you were going to wait until the state was in your age bracket. But the governor just said he wants to see everybody get vaccinated when they're eligible. You're eligible. So why not get vaccinated now? Yeah, he's going to follow the state guidelines and wait till we open up that 65 and over category. At the sake of upsetting those who kind of lobbied for the reopening of sports, Governor, we're seeing a big spike here in Franklin County, as well as Bennington and Brattleboro County. Just in Franklin County in the next 36 hours, we're going to see 10 teams play either teams coming from other counties or Franklin County teams traveling to other counties. Earlier, Dr. Levine talked about meeting with people you don't live with and traveling outside of your area as major factors in spreading the virus. Should parents and community members and adolescents in Washington, Memorial counties be worried about players traveling in and out of their county? For sports? Yeah, I think again, I'll let Dr. Levine answer this, but from my perspective, I believe we presented this and not saying that there wouldn't be any risk, but there is some risk to doing this. Everything we do with a pandemic is comes with some risk assessment and we decided the mental health of our youth was important, giving them something to do that they haven't been able to do for quite some time was important. And we weighed out the all the risks associated with such and made the decision to move forward. And I don't regret that decision. But I think that they have to, you know, parents have a responsibility to take care of their kids and everyone has to weigh this out on their own. Commissioner Levine. And you know, one thing we are very confident of is the amount of guidance that we provided and the amount of stipulations that are included. So keep in mind that, you know, parents will not be attending these games as spectators, probably won't even be chauffeuring their children because they'll probably arrive on a school bus as a team. And then they will play the game and leave. That's the way the guidance is framed. And of course, no matter what the sport, they're going to be wearing a mask. And they're going to be distanced. If it's basketball, they're going to be distanced when they're on the bench. They're going to be distanced when they're not playing on the court. And they're going to have their mask on at all times. So I understand where your level of concern is coming from, from some of the parents. But the reality is, this may indeed be one of the safest things that their families can be participating in at a time when certain counties have more activity of COVID than others. I understand at least two schools have kind of put a plug on sports for the weekend, maybe Stowe and Randolph. How many other, how many other schools have you heard of that are saying, you know what, now's not the time? I've not heard of any. I could ask Secretary French or Secretary Moore if they've been informed at all. I had Dr. Oveen. I don't have a sense of that yet either. No, this is Secretary Moore. And I would concur with that and only add that we've been very clear when asked that it is a school or district specific decision as to when they feel confident in moving forward. Okay, I'd love to have a follow up on you getting the additional information. I'd also like to be in the data that was on Friday. You can get that out. Moving on to my second question real quick. I'm hearing about health care workers that have been vaccinated that are now testing positive. Dr. Levine is the state correlating data between vaccinated people, those that are testing positive to try to track how many people are testing positive that have already been vaccinated. And so what's that data showing? So right now the data is not very extensive because there's only a small number of people that we've documented positive test in who have a history of being vaccinated. And most of those, it was between the first dose and the second dose. So it was a time that they may not have yet may mustered the complete immune response that we're looking for from a vaccine. So it's premature to really comment on any of those right now. But rest assured, if there is a person who becomes a case who has received vaccine, we know about it because that's part of our interview process with with any positive case. So can't I I'm sure I'll be able to tell you much more at some later time in the pandemic when there's enough cases that have evolved who have had vaccination. But right now it's very, very small. And I'm not aware of people after the second dose. But I will ask the team about that when I get back to see if that's been found yet. Can you follow up with me on first and second dose after you find that out today? We'll bring it up in the next press conference. Yeah, we'll we'll we'll bring it up. Thank you. Appreciate follow up. Thank you. Greg, while we have you on, can you remind at least me, maybe somebody else knows this, but I don't I don't remember what the information that we promise you to follow up on from last Friday. Yeah, I believe the health department has followed up on it. They haven't provided the list. I'm looking for a list of outbreaks, much like what apparently has been given to other media sources. A list of other outbreaks from from what sector? From the state of Vermont, I'm under the understanding, Governor, that you're provided a list, I believe on a daily basis of outbreaks. And so I've asked for that list for a public records request. Public records request takes a number of days. Okay, I think they're working on the public records request as we speak. It's not instantaneous as I have seen, so I assume that they will be back with you. I understand that. I originally asked Friday. That's why I'm saying that's why I was just reminding you that I was looking for it. I appreciate your time, Governor. Okay, thanks. Guy Cage, Conflict of the Vermont State House. Governor, yesterday seven Republican senators introduced a bill to expand funding for school resource officers. Comes a week after four Democratic and progressive senators introduced S 63 to ban school resource officers. Where do you stand on the state allowing our press funding police assigned as school resource officers? Yeah, my my opinion hasn't changed on this guy. I think it's the same answer that I use when someone, maybe it was you, had asked me about the initial ban on resource officers in schools. I believe this is a local decision. I still believe it's a local decision. I don't think we should make it mandatory. I believe that we do provide the funding for it through the Ed fund. So it's from my standpoint, it's it's a it's a local decision and still should be. Okay, so you wouldn't support a statewide ban, but not it would you support a any sort of statewide requirement? That's called a local level? Yes, that's correct. Okay, thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. My first question is for Secretary French. Secretary French, the weekly and media outlets that are here typically come out on Wednesday or Thursday with earlier in the week deadlines and so I'm wondering if you think it's possible that the new requirements for music programs in our schools might be posted either over the weekend or as early as Monday so that we can get a local reaction from our arts communities in the towns where there are weekly outlets. Thanks for the question. I'm not sure yet we are aiming for early next week. Definitely won't happen over the weekend, but you know we'll see how that goes. But we are trying to get it out as soon as possible and as soon as Monday possibly. Thank you. And a follow-up with that be posted on the health website or on the education department website or both locations? It's on the agency of education website and if you want to reach out to us we can email your copy directly. Excellent, thanks very much. I'll do that. Second question and this is presumably for Commissioner Levine or Secretary Smith. I noticed in Dr. Levine's presentation this morning that on the active outbreaks in long-term care facilities there seems to be a significant uptick at the village of Cedar Hill in Windsor and I'm wondering if that's a sizable percentage of the total population of employees and residents there and I'm wondering if you might give it a shed any more light on that outbreak and you know where it has occurred and why it's so hot. Yeah, Commissioner Levine will answer that. I just want to make sure we go back to the other request for the information on Monday and just to remind everyone it is a federal holiday on Monday. There'll be many state employees who are not working, many who are, so I don't know if they'll be able to get all that information to you on Monday. That may be a problematic. Commissioner Levine. Okay, thanks for pointing that out. Yeah, I really don't have any specifics to give you this moment about the outbreak you've referred to. I know that our health care outbreak prevention and response team has provided guidance and has been on the scene so they understand what's going on there. My main point in showing the slide was not to call attention to a facility like that but to call attention to the fact that we are seeing so much less of that at this point in time. I still want that to be the take-home message unfortunate as it is that this facility has had an outbreak. Alright, thank you very much. Hi, good afternoon. This is a question for Dr. Levine. I was looking at the updated community map for this week and in Waterbury we've seen the biggest uptick in this past seven-day cycle from last Wednesday to this Wednesday that we've seen since November. And so that's kind of jumped out at me and I'm wondering, I know you have many places on your list that you're keeping track of in terms of outbreaks and incidences that you're paying attention to and I just wonder if there's anything on your radar there that kind of jumps out as far as what might be happening here in Waterbury or if you just sort of attribute it to the community spread that you were talking about earlier. You're right. The number of outbreaks we're following is always around 80 or so but what we have found consistently throughout the state is less than 15 percent of all the cases that we document across the state have anything to do with a specific outbreak. So the outbreaks themselves are very modest in size and don't account for a high proportion of the cases, which again implies community transmission. I'll have to get a deeper dive into the Waterbury data so that I can give you an appropriate response to your question but nothing has sort of surfaced that has gone on the radar screen as a area of intense scrutiny that needs to be followed up on but we'll get back to you. Okay well that's that's good to know just off the top of your head that hasn't is that something that's super familiar so that's good to hear. Thank you. I have one other quick question for Secretary French I think thinking hearing the discussion about music and sports last week now it just occurred to me I'm wondering if there's any discussion coming anytime soon regarding the guidance around physical education classes in schools. That basically touches on all the kids that are in school if there's any look at loosening up some of the restrictions on the activities and requirements that they have right now. Yeah thanks yeah it's something we're going to take a look at we met earlier this week sort of as our regular planning cycle looking at our larger school guidance document which is about 40 pages as I mentioned our current music guidance is embedded in that larger document and we'll be pulling that out essentially when we call against this new guidance but we did make the decision to kind of we do this on a monthly basis so whether we've accumulated enough issues to reopen the 40 page document and we're going to do that. One of the issues that we have is to sort of synchronize the PE classroom instruction relative to our new guidance for winter sports so we are going to take a look at that here in the coming days and weeks. Okay great that's good to hear because it's a similar vein a lot of people are hoping that they might match up a little bit better. Thank you. Hi thanks I had a question about what it sounds like to be called phase five the chronic conditions and I apologize if this has been asked in a previous press conference I might have missed it but I'm curious as to whether people might I guess how people go about confirming that they need approvals from their doctors and will they automatically be contacted or should they reach out to their doctors proactively can you just give us a little bit about the process there. Sure Secretary Smith. Colin there there will be a verification process what that will be what that will look like we'll roll out in the next few weeks but all I can all I can say right now is there will be a multiple there'll be a attestation there may be some audit procedures in terms of making how we look at this and then secondly or thirdly we will probably utilize in some limited fashion the because we don't want to overwhelm them the primary care physicians in this verification process but there will be a verification process and do you have any rough estimate of when we might be moving into that phase five? I would pencil in somewhere mid to latter part of March got it thanks the only question I had is do we have a figure for how many doses we're expecting to come next week? I'll get back to you I think it's 10,375 but let me let me verify that for you great thanks so much yes thank you good afternoon I have a question here from a fourth grader whose class has gone remote for the week because of a positive case but whose school it's now gradually transitioning from 50% hybrid mode to a full in person students question is when we were all back in school together will there be more COVID cases? Commissioner Levine I I'll let you try that one first and this question is a fourth grader have they been remote the entire time or has it just occurred that they had to go remote? No they've been 50% hybrid updates for a couple of times including now when they've had a case within their pod and that's had to go remote for a few days very good we continue to have data that supports the fact that being in an elementary school class and having in-person learning is a very safe activity and one that rarely has to be interrupted by going to remote learning so I guess my short answer would be that this fourth grader should be very optimistic about the opportunity to go back be in person in class and not be in danger of getting COVID I will also add that more recent discussions on the part of the pediatric infectious disease community and a more national scene continues to advocate that further school reopening at the elementary school level of itself doesn't require vaccination and is inherently safe based on all of the data that's been accumulated nationally and internationally we in Vermont are actually a little ahead of that curve already because we've had such a high proportion of our elementary school kids in class and the data here continues to support that that's been a very successful intervention I do know that unfortunately across the country a very high percentage of schools have been completely closed and been remote for a long time especially in some of our larger urban areas so all of the discussions you're hearing nationally from the new administration on down are to really focus on getting those elementary school kids back in in-person learning situations okay thank you for that staying on topic with Secretary French if I may school staffing challenges has been a pretty common topic this year and I recently read a superintendent's report to local school board that highlighted some mid-year resignations as well as the anticipation that schools are likely to see a much higher than normal turnover rate going into next year because of the strain of this year do you see teacher retention and staffing as statewide concerns heading into next year considering the difficulties of this one and other factors like potential retirement plan cuts and things like that yeah thanks it could be this is starting to be the time of the year when districts are finding out about staff for next year so they're you know they've completed their budget process and now they're working through requirements of their master agreements and so forth usually between now and April 1st they'll have a sense of where the majority of their staff are in terms of returning or not so it remains to be seen but I would also observe that you know we still have the broader demographic situations that were challenging in Vermont in terms of our aging population that existed prior to COVID and those those will manifest themselves and labor issues inside of education just like they do in any other sector of our state so we do we do need to be attentive to called pipeline issues and teacher development and that will that will be a key consideration going forward for us as a state okay I do not sure if there's time for me to ask one more okay this one would be for Secretary Smith and it's a reader situation that caused a bit of concern with the online vaccine registration process the reader is in the 70-74 bracket and helped a neighbor over 75 register that neighbor didn't have an email so the reader used his own based on the suggestion the other day to go in and set up an account to streamline the process for when it was his turn the reader discovered his email is now linked to the neighbor are they going to have trouble registering come Tuesday if their email's already been used for the neighbor yeah he's either he's either going to have to because that does the email links it to that particular person so what the what's going to have to happen is that person will have to either give the call center a call and they'll help them get registered or create another email address through there for registration purposes and it's pretty easy to create another email address but yeah if you use his email for that particular person we're either going to have to call the call center or create another email address okay thank you very much everyone I have a question about people in long-term care facilities who may have kind of changed their mind about getting the vaccine and actually you know initially refused but they do want it now or maybe I don't know the status of this but new intakes or transfers to long-term care facilities how are they going to be reached to the vaccine because my understanding is that pharmacists will kind of come in and all plunge and vaccinate will there be another round will they be kind of contacted or is it kind of on an individual basis Secretary Smith yeah and with the pharmacy programs there's three rounds just to make sure that we can pick that up but as you pointed out there's going to be ongoing transfers that will come in and come out of facilities hopefully during the age banding will get most people in this state in terms of a vaccinated but in those rare instances they still qualify to be vaccinated their 1a's they're going to still qualify to be vaccinated will probably use either our homebound sort of mechanism that we've developed or will use the hospital or our healthcare partners in order to do that what we want to do right now is just continue vaccinating those that are there those are the and we've done it with three we've set up three rounds in order to make sure that people get vaccinated on this but we will make sure that they have access to vaccination and can get vaccinated as we move forward yeah because of the age banding you know if someone's not the homebound but facility bound they might not be able to go through the typical process right so yeah it goes to like the home out agency would is it the long-term care facility yeah well I mean that is their home so we will we will bring a vaccine to them if if there's no transportation not not everybody in long-term care facilities are homebound but that's their home and if we have to we'll bring the vaccine to them okay thank you that's it record time I want everybody to be safe over this three-day weekend also as a reminder the same holds true for the Daytona 500 as a Super Bowl I know not as many people watch the Daytona 500 as a Super Bowl but no no parties at home you know watch it on TV make sure you you know practice this physical distancing just stay with your families so that we can get some control on this and get through this holiday weekend so again thank you very much