 Good morning everyone. First of all I wanted to let you know I signed another one month extension to the state of emergency. As a reminder this is the tool we need for the mitigation measures still in place while we work to protect more Vermonters with the vaccine. But as we discussed last week when we outlined the Vermont forward plan won't be long before we're at a point where any adult who wants a vaccine will be able to have one and we can ease restrictions in a measured way. In the meantime it's still important that folks follow the guidelines in place. Doing so will help us get back to normal faster, help get our kids back in school and more. Yesterday Dr. Levine and I participated on a call with the FDA and CDC to get an update on the situation with the Johnston Johnson vaccine. We now have a better understanding of the timeline because they told us that about half of the J&J doses were administered in the last few weeks. That means to get to the bottom of this issue and to have confidence restarting vaccinations they needed another week or so to make sure that they collected the information needed to make that decision. So while I remain concerned about the pause especially not knowing how long it could be we at least understand what they're looking for and so that's a bit reassuring. So and they'll be meeting again next week where they will learn more in hope we'll be able to return to distribution of the J&J vaccine very soon. And finally this Monday eligibility opens to all Vermonters 16 and over but there's one change we're announcing today. Tomorrow those age 16 to 18 our high school students will be able to sign up. As you know I've made getting kids back into school a priority and this step will help give those kids the opportunity to register for Pfizer doses two days early which is their only option at this time and possibly enjoy the end of the school year in a much more normal way. And again on Monday as scheduled all Vermonters 16 plus will be eligible for vaccinations. Secretary Smith will go into further details in a few minutes so stay tuned on that. Our strategic phased approach to vaccinations is one of the reasons we rank in the top five for rate of administration and we were the first state to get to 90% of those most vulnerable those 65 and over with at least one dose. Unlike some states we've made appointments based on doses we know we're getting and it's allowed us to be nimble to react when we need to like the Johnson and Johnson issue we're dealing with right now. So we really appreciate Vermonters patients and opening eligibility to all those 16 and older will get us one step closer to the finish line. So please sign up to get your shot. There's no excuse not to at this point. The vaccine is our ticket out of the pandemic so we can enjoy time with family and friends do some normal things get people back to work and look forward to what I believe will be very good summer here in Vermont. With that I'll turn it over to Secretary French for an education update. Good morning. I'll begin my update by reviewing the results of our weekly surveillance testing of school staff. This week was a school vacation week for about half our schools so participation in the testing was off as compared to our normal rate. This week we tested 570 staff which is about a third of the number we normally test. To date this week's testing has identified no cases of COVID-19 so the positive rate positivity rate is 0%. The state positivity rate declined a bit during the same time period and remains low at 1.8%. Daily case counts in schools remain higher than what we saw in the fall. Typically we are now seeing about 10 to 20 new case reports in schools each day which certainly hasn't made it more difficult for schools to expand in-person learning. The trend in school case counts has plateaued a bit, is leveling off to a certain extent but it still fluctuates on a daily basis. We do remain confident that as the vaccine is more widely deployed the ability of the virus to spread in our communities will be reduced which in turn will reduce the number of school cases. In the meantime we will be publishing some updated guidance for our schools on the contact tracing process to ensure good coordination between schools and the health department. The contact tracing process in schools has been under increased pressure as a result of the higher case counts in our revised distancing requirements. Every month we conduct a survey that measures the amount of in-person hybrid and remote learning our students are experiencing. We implement the survey at the end of each month. I thought I'd share the results of the March survey today. 85% of our schools responded in the March survey. In summary the data from March do not show much change from February. About 55% of our students were in hybrid, 33% in-person and the remainder were remote. Again the survey is given at the end of each month so these data just represent a snapshot of specific moment in time. When we break out the data by grade level elementary students experience the slight increase in the amount of in-person. In March it was 52% whereas in February it was 50%. Fewer middle school students were in-person however that percent dropped by 5% to 24% and the amount of in-person among high school students dropped by 1% to 8%. I think again the relative stability in the data shows that the commitment on the part of our school staff and Department of Health to maintain school operations are the face of fluctuating conditions and logistical consideration. This takes a tremendous amount of work on a daily basis and I want to thank everyone for their sustained efforts in this area. On another note we receive word that the federal government has authorized the Vermont Department of Children and Families and the Agency of Education to provide a temporary food benefit to pre-K to 12 students who would normally receive free or reduced meals at school. These benefits called pandemic EBT or PEBT will be based on a student's learning model for each month. The amounts vary based on the ability of students to access meals at schools. For example the benefit provides $119.35 per student for a remote learning month at $71.61 for hybrid learning months and no benefit for an in-person learning month. The PEBT program provides an electronic benefit card to eligible households to be used for food purchases at participating grocery stores, convenience stores, online retailers, and also farmers markets. These benefits are meant to replace the value of school meals that children would have received had they been at school. The availability of the PEBT benefit does not have any impact on a child's eligibility for the free meals our schools are making available this year. Families are encouraged to use both resources to ensure children have access to healthy meals. Approximately $14.7 million in benefits will be issued to 21,844 Vermont households for September 2020 through February 2021. This will cover approximately 33,000 students. Eligible households will receive a letter explaining the benefit. All eligible households should receive their benefit by April 29th. Another benefit for March through June 2021 will be issued in July. This has been a very complex program to implement and I want to thank the many school staff around the state who work quickly to collect the required data from households and submit it us up to the state level. This quick work on their part made it possible for us to turn this program around fairly quickly and get the benefits deployed and we really appreciate their efforts. In the regular supply of healthy and nutritious foods is essential for the growth and development of our children. This benefit will help ensure students have access to nutritious meals through the end of the school year. Lastly, I wanted to provide a quick update on the development of guidance for graduations and end of school year celebrations. This guidance is on track for publication before the end of April. In the meantime, districts can use the Vermont Forward Plan to inform their end of year plans. Our guidance will essentially provide direction on how to operationalize the Vermont Forward parameters in the school setting. We are optimistic that schools will be able to hold many of these events this year and I think it's really important that we try to end the year on a celebratory note for our students. That concludes my report. I'll now turn it over to Secretary Smith. Thank you Secretary French and good morning everyone. As you know, Vermont will follow the recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and extend the pause on the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine for an additional week. The federal pause is in place to allow the CDC's advisory committee to the time it needs to gather more data about reporting side effects. The committee will meet again next week. This means all Vermont Johnson & Johnson appointments have been canceled through Friday, April 23rd. We have reached out to those that have had appointments scheduled to reschedule. If you have questions or need assistance or you haven't been contacted by the Health Department, please call the Vaccine Call Center at 855-722-7878. The department is working hard to open as many additional appointments as possible for Pfizer and Moderna vaccines and expect everyone impacted by this pause will be able to get an appointment by the end of April. We will have some Johnson & Johnson clinics on the schedule after April 23rd which accounts for about 390 appointments. We haven't canceled them yet but I want to highlight that at this time we are not scheduling Johnson & Johnson appointments. Those who have made appointments with CVS or Walgreens should follow the pharmacies instructions about rescheduling. Anyone who wants to make a new appointment through the state's registration system can call the Vaccine Call Center at 855-722-7878. At this point we don't feel this week's delay will impact our overall schedule for vaccine completion and by July 4th if Johnson & Johnson vaccines continue we will open up more slots and offer to move up appointments. We will continue to keep you informed as more information about Johnson & Johnson vaccines become available. Now let's talk a little bit about what the governor announced about opening up registration for the next age group 16 and 17 year olds and 18 year olds. The FDA requires that 16 to 17 year olds receive only the Pfizer vaccine. This age group 16 and 17 year olds are not eligible for Moderna or Johnson & Johnson vaccine that we received in Vermont. We also want to vaccinate high school graduates who have missed out on key opportunities at a pivotal time in their lives so we decided to open up registration early for Vermon or 16 to 18 years old beginning this Saturday at 10 a.m. This will ensure that there are enough Pfizer appointments for 16 to 17 year olds. It will also assist high school seniors to get earlier appointments. Please note the different time for the weekend registration is at 10 o'clock. The entire age group grouping 16 plus will be available to register online well everyone that's over 16 will be able to register online beginning on Monday April 19th at 6 a.m. Again notice the time it's a little bit earlier than usual you can register online beginning on Monday 16 and above. So those that are 16 to 29 and above can register on Monday April 19th at 6 a.m. All of this means that on Monday all Vermoners aged 16 and older will be eligible to receive a vaccine. Again you can make an appointment through the state's website at healthfermont.gov slash my vaccine if you are unable to sign up online you can call the number 855-722-7878. Please remember this that if you are 16 or 17 years old you will need your parents or legal guardians consent to register and make an appointment. There is there is a registration box that the parent or legal guardian can check in this registration process. Moving on to those 30 and older we have opened registration this week nearly 18,000 people have made appointments and as of this morning 59% of those in this age group have either been vaccinated or have made appointments. Turning to the BIPOC Vermoners and households 6,400 individuals have made appointments. We have made progress to close the gap between non-Hispanic whites and the BIPOC community from 13.3% which was the gap that I talked about a few weeks ago to 8.9% when comparing percentage of people vaccinated. If you have not done so already I encourage the BIPOC Vermoners and I encourage BIPOC Vermoners and household members especially those 65 and older to make an appointment on the state website at healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine. We have seen that 65 years and older in the BIPOC community is lagging for registration so we encourage 65 and older to please register on healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine or if you're unable to sign up online you can call 855-722-7878 please press 1 if you need an interpreter interpreter services. Let's talk about the overall progress in terms of the overall progress as of this morning 279,400 people have been vaccinated against COVID-19. 92,900 have received their first dose of vaccine and 186,500 have received their first and last doses. Just to wrap up a little bit it's hard to believe that over half of all eligible Vermoners have been vaccinated with at least one dose of vaccine and that I just announced that in the next few days all Vermoners will be eligible to be vaccinated. It is remarkable and exciting how far we've come. For example one year ago we had limited testing capabilities but we set a goal to achieve and then we accomplished building our state's testing capabilities to the point that is one of the most robust in the country. Today any Vermoner that wants a test can get a COVID-19 test and we urge Vermoners to continue to avail themselves of these opportunities. We have gone from no vaccine just a few short months ago to vaccinating as I just mentioned over half of all Vermoners in a relatively short period of time of course. There is more to do and we urge all Vermoners to get vaccinated but a year ago we were uncertain what the future would look like and although we must remain vigilant to stop the spread of the virus as we vaccinate the remainder of Vermoners there is much hope. The light at the end of the long tunnel is becoming much brighter and soon our lives will return to normal. None of this would have been possible without you Vermoners doing your part to protect yourself your loved ones and your neighbors from COVID-19. All I have to say is thank you. I'll now turn it over to Dr. Levine for a health update. Thank you Secretary Smith. Overall we're not seeing a lot of change in COVID-19 data right now. Daily case numbers continue in their range of under 100 to the close to 200 range but our seven-day average continues to trend downward and is below 140. Modeling projections continue to look along the more favorable scenarios as opposed to the worst case scenarios. Percent positivity rate continues below 2% at 1.9%. Hospitalization numbers continue in the same range and today are 26 with three in the ICU. Our recent reported deaths are unfortunately bringing us now to 242. As we've discussed previously that figure represents a lagging indicator relative to spread of the virus in the state but we do know that the majority in April were among hospitalized individuals. On the very human level each and every one represents much more than a statistic and we extend our sympathies to family and friends. I can also share that we've now found variants of the virus in specimens from residents in 10 of Vermont's 14 counties. We only sequence a small number of samples at this point so while we can't assess the true prevalence at this point we are presuming these variants are circulating throughout the state making up an increasing proportion of our positive tests. The overwhelming majority are the B117 first detected in the UK. This highly transmissible variant is fast becoming the dominant strain in the country. It at least partially explains why the virus seems to be spreading more easily in the state and as a stark indicator of why adhering closely to all prevention measures is really essential even now even as we continue to vaccinate as many Vermonters as quickly as we can. Speaking of which I need to re-emphasize what was just said we have just surpassed 50 percent of Vermonters age 16 and older having received their first dose of vaccine and fully one-third of adults are now fully vaccinated. Quite a significant milestone. Seeing those percentages go up every day is really encouraging knowing that more and more Vermonters are protecting themselves and each other and getting us all closer to a time when we can move forward living our lives safely. This is progress. The virus is still here and it is spreading especially among younger Vermonters who've not yet been able to get vaccinated yet with the benefit of nearly a year and a half of intense medical learning about the virus and how it spreads. My strong advice for those of you traveling for spring break is to go out of your way to follow all of the basic and simple prevention guidance. Rely on what we know works wearing a mask even a double mask keeping your distance from others and avoiding crowds and make a plan for when you'll make your vaccine appointment. Go to healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine create your account today so you'll be ready for tomorrow and Monday when the final age groups open up and all Vermonters have become eligible. Finally I want to follow up on some of what the Governor and Secretary Smith have said about the pause of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. As you've heard the CDC's advisory committee met Wednesday to reveal data about an extremely rare and severe type of blood clot reported among six of the more than seven million people in the US who've received this vaccine. The committee determined it needed more time to gather data on the side effects. Whether you received this vaccine already your vaccine appointment was impacted by the pause or you are worried that this might affect vaccination efforts generally I want you to know that I and all of us understand your concerns and frustration. The pandemic has been long and difficult in its throne many curveballs along the way. This type of news in some ways can only add to the stress however and despite the few cases relative to the number of people vaccinated it is appropriate and it's important that this committee of medical and public health experts be able to complete its process to review the data to provide guidance to the patient's health care providers. This is public health's commitment to safety and transparency and it's how we build confidence in all vaccines. There are several points I want people to understand about the pause, the J&J vaccine and the actions underway. First this disorder seems to only have been reported in the US with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. The other two vaccines in current use Pfizer and Moderna have not been associated with this. You should keep your appointment and feel safe in getting these vaccines. The risk to any one person who received the J&J vaccine recently is extremely low. Even so if you've received the vaccine within the past three weeks and you develop severe headache, abdominal pain, leg pain or swelling or shortness of breath contact your health care provider. If it's been more than a month since you were vaccinated you most likely have passed the critical time for this side effect. There are three key reasons for the pause. One to elucidate or educate clinicians about identifying this rare and novel disorder and the appropriate diagnosis and unique set of treatments. And to allow them to reflect on recent patient encounters and report potential cases that CDC can then review. Second to educate and conduct outreach with you all in the public. And third to wait this additional week so that if any of the three million recently vaccinated people are going to develop this this disorder it can be recognized and included in the analysis that's being conducted. We will continue to keep Vermonters informed as things progress and you can stay up to date at healthvermont.gov slash my vaccine or by following the departments at Health Vermont Facebook and Twitter feeds. I'm hopeful that in the end we can move ahead using this vaccine with confidence. A one dose shot is viewed by many as convenient and effective and from a logistics perspective has the advantage of being easy to store and administer. A single dose vaccine may be especially helpful in protecting certain populations who may be harder to reach such as farm workers or people experiencing homelessness. But regardless of what happens with the J&J vaccine we will continue working with our community and health care partners to get these individuals vaccinated with vaccine that is safe and effective. In the meantime I again thank Vermonters for their patience and support of public health. We've made it so far through so many ups and downs during this pandemic and we get closer to the finish line every day. Thank you Dr. Levine we'll now open it up to questions. All right we'll start with Christina from WCAS. Good morning Governor. So first I want to talk about the 16 to 18 year olds registration opening tomorrow. How do you first plan to reach these 16 to 18 year olds? You are dealing not only with students who are under their parents supervision who require their permission but are they going to be able to take time out of school? How will schools accommodate that time out of the classroom? Is it going to disrupt education? Yeah, you know I don't have all the answers to those questions. I believe that Secretary French will be alerting the schools as to to this two day advance notice and we hope that students will take advantage of this and find some time within their schedules to make their appointments. So they can be made through our health care providers, our pharmacies and the Department of Health and some of our sites that we have set up. So there are a number of different options available and we just hope that they'll be able to take advantage of those and again to reiterate you know Pfizer is their only option because of the emergency authorization for 16 and over for just Pfizer. So that's why we wanted to give them a bit of a head start to make sure all the appointments weren't taken by the time they had an opportunity to sign up. So I wanted to clarify can 18 year olds not get Moderna then or they can? 18 year old can get the Moderna. Okay, then another follow-up question. How do you expect that 19 to 29 year old crowd is going to take this news? They now know they are the last to be eligible to receive their vaccine but there are also the people who work in the service industry and their college students who are displaying very clearly their pandemic fatigue and I'm among one of those people you know. Well again we've said all along that it was going to be on Monday the 19th opening this up to this category. Now we've announced that it's going to be a couple of hours early so you have that opportunity and we're talking about a fairly small population of those 16 to 18 year olds that again we just want to give them just a bit of a head start. This is a milestone in their lives something that many people remember their their graduation and we're hoping we're hoping after all they've had to give up over the last year that everyone will have some empathy for them and to allow them to have some sort of a normal graduation as a result so we didn't want this to get in the way of them having that not being able to to get their appointments later and we just think it's the right thing to do. One last quick logistical question probably for Secretary French but do you know how many schools we'll be switching back to in-person learning after April break? I do not know and I'm not sure that Secretary French knows but we'll ask him. Secretary French did you get that question? We don't and then the other half next week so I think you know the combination of vacation plus the you know the conditions as I mentioned are fairly challenging right now. I think you know a lot of schools have plans but they're going to make those decisions based on the real situation that they're experiencing on the ground. I think we missed the first half of that Secretary French. Oh sorry can you hear me now? We can. Yeah so I was just saying it's going to be challenging to understand that at the moment because we have half the schools out on vacation now and the other half out the following week but I think you know the the dynamics certainly the guidance certainly enables more in person but I think just the challenges of the elevated case counts that we're seeing provide some headwinds into their decision-making so it's hard it's hard to ascertain actually I think what's going to happen in the next couple of weeks but we think certainly as the case counts improve and conditions improve we will see more in person. Thank you. Governor or doctor I was just wondering about the recent group of deaths and hospitalizations breakdown on ages of those folks are we still seeing the elderly primarily or are we seeing more of the younger folks being affected by this especially in the death rate? I had my concerns as well so I reached out to Dr. Levine and I believe he has some answers my questions were about whether they've been vaccinated partially vaccinated or fully vaccinated Dr. Levine. Yes thanks Steve. So one thing people have to understand is that not every death actually occurred on the day before it's reported for various reasons the way that's reported both for people who died within state or may have died in another state. The death rate over the course of April right now is certainly trending lower than the preceding three months probably closer to March but maybe even lower than March which was the low point in those three months for numbers of deaths. The majority have been people in the hospital. I've not noted any in actually a long-term care facility itself a couple of people at their home some of the people who died in the hospital may have been living in a long-term care facility but they clearly were hospitalized and died in the hospital. The age range goes from mostly the 50 to 90 plus age range with a little predilection to the higher age range. There tend to be more females than males. The majority of these are labeled in our system as not fully vaccinated trying to discern if any of them were partially vaccinated or not and we'll have that data at a later time but none of them were fully vaccinated even in the older age range. Again I think speaking testimony to the benefits of vaccination for sure and these individuals unfortunately did represent a sicker subset of the Vermont population in terms of pre-existing illnesses comorbidities as we call it chronic diseases and a number of them did you know it's always questioned by people in the lay community the lay community did these people actually die from COVID so in a number of cases the majority these truly were from getting COVID in a minority they were issues with having COVID as a disease that they probably died with but not died off but the majority COVID was instrumental in that. Thank you. Stuart, NBC5. Wondering Governor as you extend the state of emergency your colleague in New Hampshire has let the mask mandate expire what are your thoughts about the difference in the approach between the two states? Well I think if we look across the country every state has taken a different approach we certainly have here in Vermont we've done a lot of things that other states have not done every governor has to take that into account and and do what they think is best for their state as have we here and as I have tried to do since the very beginning. New Hampshire was one of the last to initiate a mask mandate and they are one of the first to in the northeast that is one of the first to not have a mask mandate so I don't know this is a surprise but we're on course we have a plan that we rolled out the Vermont forward plan and we believe by the 4th of July we'll be in much better shape we can always accelerate if we find that things are getting much better than our expectations but at this point in time we think we're doing the right thing. Can I ask you about those highway signs that were put up several months ago all telling people they must quarantine or isolate if they enter the state? They're going to stay up? No. What are you going to do with them and when? We'll be taking those down we talked about that earlier we just haven't gotten to it so they'll be coming down and being either replaced with another sign or not have any sign at all at those locations. Lastly the March unemployment numbers and employment data came out this morning and it shows that we even with this recovery still had fewer people in the workforce this month than last what does that tell you? Well again you know we suffered from a lot of those workforce challenges pre-pandemic and as I've said continuously those issues didn't magically go away they're going to be with us after the pandemic is over so I'm concerned obviously about that that's why all our strategies that's why you know the plan that we laid out for the ARPA money is all about trying to make our lives different bring more people into the state more affordable housing all kinds of initiatives investments in order for us to welcome more people back into the state because we need them pre-pandemic as you remember we had a very low unemployment rate the lowest in the country but we had more jobs available and then we had people to fill them that's going to be the case after the pandemic as well so I continue to be concerned that's why again that's why we're so focused on trying to bring more people into the state. Thank you very much. Lisa the Associated Press Lisa the AP will move to Greg the County Carrier. Good morning Governor I was speaking with some people this morning who had appointments for the Johnson and Johnson vaccine that was disappointed that their appointments were canceled for basically a one in a million blood clot concerns some of them were wondering why the state forced the closure of the cancellation for these vaccines and and didn't allow for those who were willing to take that one in a million risk to uh to go ahead with them. Yeah no it's a good question I know that some were questioning when you look at the the data but as we we've done from the very beginning we listened to the health experts the health experts the CDC and the FDA told us we needed to pause a recommendation and I don't know is there's been any state who has circumvented that recommendation so we think it's the prudent thing to do it's unfortunate but we think it'll be short-lived we believe by the end of the week they will come out with some recommendations further recommendations and implement the Johnson and Johnson but we just thought it was the the right approach again from the very beginning we've listened to the health experts and I certainly wouldn't want to and we've you know we've we've decided on you know with the abundance of caution that they have as well so again we can second guess that but but that's been their approach from the beginning Dr. Levine um maybe I'll just ask Dr. Levine if he wants to add anything to that one thing I'll say if there's one message that every young doctor needs to get and have when they graduate medical school it is three words do no harm if you think anything you're going to possibly do has the potential to do harm you in these these need to think about that you need to have a good discussion with your patient about possible benefits possible harms a process called shared decision-making so that everyone is educated about it the medical community and the public health community at large have felt that we need that extra little bit of time to get more information so that we truly cannot do harm and if the vaccine even if it provides harm to a very narrow focus of people in the country that we identify them clearly and understand that before we go further keep in mind also these are vaccines that are still under emergency use authorization which is not to say that this is a major experiment going on but it is to say that they haven't gone through as long a time period of being evaluated because of the trials going the number of months they went and now our experience reviewing the people in the trials months and months later but also our experience with all of the people in the country in the world getting the vaccine and reviewing how they're doing so it's a prudent thing to do at this time in our experience with vaccines i'll let you ask your next question to the governor all right thank you thank you dr z and governor one last question here Stuart mentioned a few minutes ago about the labor statistics being announced earlier this morning they showed that about 10 and a half percent of the workforce is collecting unemployment uh we've already addressed in recent weeks that you're you're not ready to immediately re-institute a work search requirement but we're also hearing from contractors who have projects lined up with the state with v-trans um that they're having really hard time getting workers back on the payroll because it's too lucrative to be on unemployment and some of these workers may actually lose money going back to work will your administration be waiving deadline penalties for contractors who are not able to get workers to come back to work um we'll take that up um obviously it's a little bit too early at this point in time as a former contractor myself April 15th at this point is still early to get back in the excavation business so uh it's too soon in some respects to uh to allow for any exemptions uh you know broadly but we'll take it we'll take it into account if we see that this progresses we certainly will we'll certainly contemplate that in your opinion governor what when's the appropriate time uh for for contracts to begin if April 15th on a very mild spring is too soon well I can only tell you again from experience um typically in Vermont May 15th is about when contractors get back to work that's when most of the uh the the um the restrictions on on back roads are lifted May 15th that's when the frost is out of the ground the mud is dried up and you can travel on some of those roads so um typically around you know May May is the time when contractors go back to work I've seen a number of them back to work now there's one working on I-89 and and I know there are many who have been able to do that so again I think it's um um we'll take it into account uh when uh when we do start up and if there's a an issue uh we'll we'll reflect on that I will say the work search requirements as I've said before we will be putting those back into place uh fairly soon but that's not necessarily going to fix the problem either but we'll um we'll be putting that into place fairly soon thank you governor it's a great weekend and I appreciate your time Lisa Loomis, the Valley Reporter Good morning I think these questions are probably for Secretary Smith what is the status of the almost 6,000 Johnson and Johnson vaccines that are not being administered until the CDC completes it to review will they be destroyed do they have a shelf life in itself what is their expiration date yeah we we don't uh kind you know they aren't uh they don't have a shelf life issue at this point in time um this two-week delay will not impact uh that that supply uh they have stopped shipping us uh any of the Johnson and Johnson at this point in time but any we any we have in supply is safe uh and uh we'll be able to utilize that once this order is lifted great thank you and Arita has asked if we can verify the EMPs are partnering with the state on COVID testing and vaccine distribution are being paid $40 an hour can you confirm that and are federal coronavirus funds being used to cover this expense I don't know what the rate is but I'm sure that we're using FEMA funding and CRF to all this federal funding uh to uh to um pay for that uh for that benefit but at least we are using federal funding FEMA funding particular in this area I don't know the rate that you have uh described but let me do this let me have uh do some research and get back to you thank you very much that's it for me thanks Jason uh Governor one quick follow-up please uh Dr. Levine indicated this morning four counties are without the variant have you been briefed as to which four counties are undetected as of now and which ones are they I don't have that information Dr. Levine I can't tell you off the top of my head but I can tell you it's on our website because we have a new page about the variants and it shows two columns the b117 and the b1429 and the counties and the counts of those I just can't give you uh I don't want to be incorrect at the podium and give you the names and maybe miss one okay but I would also I would also say that a county that shows zero you should assume the number is greater than zero this virus does not respect borders at all and um the sampling process may not have just picked it up in those counties so I wouldn't want any citizen to assume that as long as they stay home in their county they're not going to see the variant because that's not going to be true yeah no I I I think you know going back to the very beginning when the town of Georgia was repeatedly reported as having zero and uh we knew that there had been cases uh I don't think anybody assumes that they're without but anyway Governor uh an Islander reader is wondering what your administration is doing about preparing for potential approval of the Pfizer vaccine for for 12 to 16 year olds uh for modders um and if the shots will become immediately they're going to be eligible to register for the vaccination upon that approval what is your administration doing for the 12 to 16 year olds yeah we um you know we're awaiting that emergency approval and we're also awaiting our supply data we have to get through what we've already committed to at this point but just as soon as we possibly can we want to be able to implement whatever they allow us to do so that's the 12 to 16 year olds would be a great improvement and provide for a greater number of Vermonters having being protected so we're looking forward to that but I have no idea when that's going to happen so this once it's approved there will be a sign up that there might be a delay because of the I I wouldn't say that it yeah I we just don't know yet Mike again we'll just implement that just as quick as it comes out and open it up as another age group so as we've opened up the 16 and over at this point in time we believe that we'll be on a path to open up by July 4th and possibly sooner depending on the supply of J&J but we'll also implement whatever policy they put into place so that we can get the vaccination process started just as quick as we possibly can with the supply in mind thank you as always have a good weekend thank you Joe the Barton Chronicle thank you um I am curious um has the manufacturer of the Johnson and Johnson been halted as well as the distribution I know that there was a problem and a likely shortage to begin with assuming that it is clear to be used again will the supplies jump because of the lag yeah I can't confirm this maybe Dr. Levine has more specific information but I can speculate and I would say that Johnson Johnson is continuing to manufacture and because they have confidence in the product that they have put forward and and seen the results of that so I would imagine speculate that they are continuing to manufacture the vaccine Dr. Levine yeah that's my impression as well there was nothing in what the advisory committee said or did that told the company itself what it could or couldn't do at this point in time Governor if I could just add a comment on the 12 to 16 year olds as well all that has happened thus far as Pfizer has put out some media release regarding their very optimistic view of their data not that they're distorting it I don't want to give that impression and saying that they had great success in their trials I don't believe that has yet been translated into the application for an EUA because usually when that happens there's a lot of fanfare and we know when the committee is meeting about it and we're poised to act the day after the committee meets regarding it so that's the process that will occur so we'll have some advanced notice about that and be easily able to set everything up that we usually do when we open up a new age band my suspicion will be that isn't happening in the next couple of weeks and it may not happen till even June at that point in time there's going to be an abundance of vaccine for every state and we hope we will not be constrained by the resource allocation process because there'll be plenty of vaccine that might outstrip even the demand for the vaccine so it won't be as challenging to immediately open up a 12 to 16 age band and provide them with the vaccine real time thank you Dr. Levine I've got another one of those questions that I suspect you're going to say ask again later but it occurs to me now I know that there's been ongoing research and I am curious as to whether it is becoming clear how long the current vaccines will be good for at what point someone might need a booster and also whether the vaccine manufacturers are working to tweak the vaccines that they currently have to perhaps make them more effective against variants and should that be the case how that might affect the ability to provide boosters in the long term or even the near term sure no those are good questions and I can actually give you a pretty good answer this was even addressed in front of Congress yesterday by some of the White House experts in Washington who did not give a highly specific and conclusive answer but give us a good idea of what's happening everyone believes the duration of the vaccine provided immunity is greater than six months most people do believe it would require a booster at some point so that this vaccine will appear to be more like the kind of vaccines we get with some frequency like the flu shot as opposed to vaccines we may have gotten in childhood and never get again which is fine that's just the reality of the kind of virus we're dealing with with regard to the variants what's becoming more obvious is even with a variant and a definition of a variant is essentially the virus has had some mutation in the spike proteins but there's a lot of those spike protein genetic codes so each variant only has its very special mix of those mutations even with the variants if you can overwhelm the virus with a large amount of antibody it doesn't matter which variant you're dealing with you're going to be overall successful in controlling the ability of human beings to get infected and then transmit that variant strain so it's keeping the antibody level high enough and that's the whole concept behind what a booster dose does it's just boosting your level of antibody when it may have been dipping a little lower than would be as helpful for you and fighting off the virus yes we can tweak the mRNA and if a Brazilian variant started to become more dominant here and it seemed to have greater ability to evade the vaccine yes people could be provided with that but again you don't want to have to have a virus put us in a whack-a-mole kind of posture and really the way around that is just to have enough people vaccinated and have each person's level of antibody be sufficiently high enough that vaccine will do exactly what it was designed to do so that's my answer for today thank you very much governor several of my readers are wondering why hospitals are not administering the vaccine to patients is this true and can you tell me why I don't have the answer to that maybe dr. Levine does I would hate that everyone hear a blanket statement that hospitals are not administering the vaccines to patients you may recall back in the beginning we actually wanted to make sure that hospitals administered vaccines to patients in the age range we were doing in case there was a risk of them wasting doses that they would have some left over for those who were in the hospital hospitals are getting some allocation of vaccine right now and the goal of that is mainly for their emergency room setting where they may see somebody who is vulnerable and may not actually have any other contact with the health care system and this provides a great opportunity to begin their vaccine process so that's one aspect and of course the j and j was especially attractive for that hospitals also are occasionally or perhaps frequently discharging patients who have recovered from whatever they were hospitalized with to nursing homes and other long-term care facilities we wanted to make sure there was a ready way for those patients to have vaccine yes we could deliver vaccine to the nursing homes etc etc but this is really nice to be able to build it into a health care encounter if you will like a hospital stay is so no we're not encouraging hospitals to become the prime vaccinators right now we have a huge pharmacy workforce we have a huge state public health workforce and we have all of our mass vaccination sites often of which they are partnered with hospitals to carry out their task but the hospital itself doesn't have to be a major component of the vaccine strategy now so is that clear um yes i guess what you're saying is there are situations in which the hospital will but it's not the uh it's that first resort for people perfect not an automatic perfect yes um governor um last year you were a big supporter of uh for monitor supporting the bdf uh during the economic downturn uh couple months ago governor welch sorry congressman welch on a uh during a house hearing called for a new model of government funding of the media i guess not unlike the bbc and other other organizations what do you think about idea of government direct government support of the media as a as a business model yeah well i'm a capitalist at heart so um i think the model we have as frustrating as it can be at times with a lot of the polar is polarization that we're seeing amongst all sectors including the media i still believe that's the best model to use i don't think the government should run that thank you uh yes thank you uh good afternoon follow-up to stewart's question earlier about the math mandate uh you said each state has to do what it thinks is that but i recollect in the fall of surgenetics county cases being linked to the cross board of interaction to be answered how concerned are you given the late stage of the pandemic is that decisions being made other states will be felt in Vermont especially a corner like epic county that has no vaccination rates older population and and now presumably interaction with uh new hansher folks that might not be here for the guys as well you know i would say that my concern about that other states and what's happening in other states has been my concern from day one as you might remember there was a quite a spike in new york and boston in particular and that's where we saw a lot of growth new jersey uh Connecticut as well and we saw a lot of cases a lot of deaths as a result and we tried to protect ourselves as best we could with our travel policies but i'm you know comforted in some respects by the fact that we have a high uptake of of those who want the vaccine here in vermont that is in the case in every state but there seems to be a lot of demand here in the state and so we're trying to to protect vermonters as quick as we possibly can with the limited supply that we're receiving so that's what will save us and and from my perspective why we need to continue with the other guidance that we put into place mass mandates being one that we want to continue that until everyone is substantially vaccinated so we'll continue with our approach and we believe that vermonters should have some self-responsibility as well and protect themselves and their families and utilize the the guidance that we have in place including wearing a mask thank you shifting gears perhaps for dr levine guidance um for high schoolers that could potentially start receiving doses if they're lucky with scheduling as soon as this weekend um if they have some of the common side effects from the dose like um soreness or throat sneezing those types of things is the advice in an abundance of caution for them to stay home until that clears or and students go to school even if they have some of the mild side effects yeah very timely question andrew um i i don't want to be a contributor to any potential absenteeism rate issue but i do believe the high school student should follow the guidance that we've been giving everybody all along so if they have symptoms that are concerning to them that could be vaccine side effects but could also be related to covid infection they owe it to their community their school community to stay home for the day we're not finding that people in the workforce at higher ages are having to take abundant time off from work because of side effects from the vaccine it's not unusual for someone to feel some of these for a half a day or a day and um take that time off and in fact our initial counseling to people has always been we didn't want their entire workforce vaccinated at the same point in time just because of the fact that we don't want to have high absenteeism rate all at once thank you thank you very much Derek seven days yeah um good afternoon governor um i'm wondering if uh this early vaccine registration for high schoolers is is actually going to expand uh in-person learning uh and if that's the goal it would seem to me the way to do that would be a more concerted campaign for instance like clinics on campus next week or maybe last week more than just opening registration a little bit earlier yeah you know we considered that and went through that we we had hoped that we might be able to provide for vaccination clinics on campus at high schools and and but i got somewhat um from a from a logistical standpoint it got to be problem problematic having to make sure that they registered having to make sure that they have authorization from their their parents and then having to prioritize we have a lot of high schools in in the state and we can't get to them all at the same time so then we'd have to make the decisions about where we go first and what's the uptake there what's the response going to be so again we went through that and we'd hope that we could put a plan into place but it just would have taken away from all our other efforts so we thought this was the best approach and and again we we had we considered doing what you had what you'd said but it just didn't work out yes so do you think this will expand in person learning or is this more about you know ensuring there can be in person graduation yeah from our standpoint i think it's more about the graduations because when you think about the the two dose uh vaccines it takes you know first dose 30 days later second dose and two weeks after that so at that point in time we're getting into uh close to to june well into may so again that's our that's our hope graduation and and is there a is there a public health case to be made for moving uh 16 18 year olds up here i know that you know the 20 the 29 categories where we've seen the highest case rates those those folks are more likely to be working public facing jobs or live in congregate settings on campus where where the virus can spread more quickly i would think what is is there a public health case for this well we again we're going to open up 16 and above um on monday anyhow so this is just giving them two days uh advance uh notice so to speak so they can sign up because they only have one option the Pfizer and we just thought it was the right thing to do but uh maybe dr levine can answer the other part of that that's exactly true governor the the public health health equity case to be made is to make sure that they have access to the only vaccine that they can possibly be administered which is Pfizer everyone else registering in the age range you're talking about will have choice in their vaccine because it's not age determined but this group it's specifically age determined so that's our intent and it should be successful um and accomplishing that goal great thank you and lastly uh is this a is this a uh decision that the state's vaccine implementation advisory committee discussed and recommended i don't believe this was one of the things that they uh recommended i'm sure they would agree with me knowing who's on there that uh from uh ethics and health equity standpoint it's the right thing to do if i could speak for them but um that's all i can say okay thank you eric times arcus yes governor we heard from the head of a school wanting to know how the vermont forward plan will protect children who don't have the option to get vaccinated she expressed concern about the variants and how they may affect children um the move from going uh math mandate to a recommended math down the timeline um and a direct quote from her i'm feeling very vulnerable as a school leader who is in charge of keeping these children safe at a school without a lot of support to do so well again we will be providing guidance at that point when the emergency order ceases to exist and part of the guidance will be in those situations i would imagine uh to have those who are not vaccinated to wear a mask in those situations but uh we will be contemplating that and giving the guidance the best we can and hopefully by that time there will be more options available for a younger population to be vaccinated so again it's a it's a while between now and um in september and i think things will change dramatically uh in the in between that time and we believe as well um and again this is a more of a question for dr. Levine and maybe dr. Kelso from an epidemiologist standpoint um but we we hope that we're reaching herd immunity at that point uh and that we will be able to um suffocate to stifle the uh the rate of spread of the uh the uh of the uh variants as well as the um transmission of this disease and i know you uh spoken about this before about the push and pull of opening too fast and now opening up fast enough what would you say to those who feel this uh the opening plan is too risky um which which plan are you talking about do you mean the vermont forward plan yes well again it's uh it's based upon the vaccination rates it's done in steps um we believe that this is prudent and when you look across the country we're still one of the more cautious states and uh has has been reflected with uh nyhampshire's announcement this just isn't our approach so we've been doing things i think fairly well here in the state and uh we're continuing continuing um with the same thought process and uh we think this is a methodical strategic and safe way to reopen to get to uh point where we're back to normal i'd like to have dr levine answer the question your previous question as well you might be interested to know that i guess it was eight o'clock this morning the governor asked me specifically about the variants and the fact that we were seeing more infections in kids and is there something about the variant with regard to kids and since that time i've been able to do a little bit of research as well as speak with some of my uh academic clinical infectious disease colleagues and the consensus is pretty much that the variants have an increased rate of transmissibility across the age spectrum so it's not a surprise we're seeing it in this pediatric population as well but it's not unique to that population nor is there something from human physiology standpoint that has currently or yet to be worked out that would indicate that there'd be a unique susceptibility in the kids to the virus that we're talking about um and to the variant strain specifically so uh that sort of input on that i might also add you know we've been talking a lot about um masking and mask mandates and what have you this morning and the governor and all of us in the team would not have um been um recommending a mask mandate if there wasn't scientific evidence that a mandate does give you some incremental benefit uh in the power of masking in preventing more transmission of infection but i don't want people to forget the fact that even without a mandate just masking is the concept here and masking is still a very powerful um intervention and mitigation strategy as we've shown over and over again um i feel like this is a first president bush kind of message about read my lips but we've been talking about governor sununu and all the focus has been in the headline on the mask mandate is gone but if you actually heard what he said and what his public health team is saying constantly it is still wear masks it's just we've taken the mandate away he hasn't taken away the emphasis on the power of masking and the evidence that masking can be helpful to the population of new hampshire so we hope they'll listen to that because uh as the previous questioner i guess andrew was asking about sx county we are concerned about that and we'd like to see um our improvement in rates continue okay thank you very much yeah a couple more things on that while i'm thinking of it uh in defense of new hampshire uh they took a different approach as well and some of their communities uh have mask mandates in place and will continue to have mask mandates in place i think hand over being one so i don't know how many others uh throughout new hampshire have those but those are community-based as well i just wanted to again remind everyone with our forward plan this was put together in conjunction with our whole team and our health experts and so we wouldn't have moved forward with this without their approval without their insight and without their recommendations so we all feel strongly that this is a safe approach and that it is based on uh a strategy that we've been using since day one and uh and the number of vaccinations in the supply of vaccine coming into the state and we feel good about it and uh that it's safe okay thank you hi i wanted to ask another question about new hampshire uh starting on monday they are allowing uh anyone to get vaccinated there regardless of residency which means that for some vermonters who live on the border that may end up being a viable option for them to get the vaccines sooner is this something that you would encourage people to take advantage of and is this based on publicizing that as a potential option for people in these cornered communities yeah well again up in the northeast kingdom we have made a deal with a hospital uh there in colbrook uh to administer vaccines for vermonters so um trying to find if you live on the border and there's a vaccine site available and they have a supply then i think they should and it seems as though maybe new hampshire has more supply than demand i don't know that for sure but but if they're opening up to a larger sector they should maybe give it a try but i i have a feeling that with their appointments they may be stretched out uh into maybe may or june uh at this point in time but but we'll see what happens when they open it up uh to everyone um we're hoping uh again by the end of the month if we get the johnson johnson back online uh we'll be doing somewhat of the same thing i think we we had announced uh i think it was the 30th of april uh that we are going to open it up to those uh who have um are coming back to the state second homeowners as well as those uh uh in in universities and colleges who are even going back home for the summer to sign up so they can get at least get their first dose while they're here so we're we're doing the same thing but we don't have the supply it doesn't appear that we have the supply that they do maybe because the the demand that we we have um are experiencing john thank you cat wcax i have a couple clarifying questions are the federal pharmacy partners also ready to sign up the 16 to 18 year old group tomorrow yes great and will the state be releasing more vaccine appointments tomorrow i know some people in different areas of the state have told us appointments are booked a little far out in their area secretary smith cat we will be releasing Pfizer appointments tomorrow for those uh 16 17 18 year olds as well for the 18 year olds they'll have a a more um more appointments available to them how many appointments are going to be available tomorrow i don't have that in right at my hand but we'll be we will definitely be opening Pfizer appointments i'll get that for you awesome and do you expect that there will be a high vaccine uptake among the younger age groups um we know some research showed up to maybe 20 percent of people 18 to 24 didn't really plan on getting the vaccine that might have been a national number though yeah i i guess we expect them to log down people with us i mean using um commissioner p checks um data that he's been showing we expect a high uptake along all the age groups uh obviously this is the age group that we're concerned most about uh because you think you're invincible at at this age um at a younger age so i'm hoping that we have the uptake based upon the the survey data that we have accumulated secondly i just want to say we aren't just sort of sitting by we are communicating out uh on the benefits of a vaccine and as i've said before our our plan is to have vermonas of that age telling other vermonas of that age why this is important to get vaccinated so i hope um through parents through legal guardians through uh friends and associates uh because they won't listen um people tend to listen to their peer groups through friends that they will listen and get vaccinated and that's our hope here um i think we'll see a fairly significant uh uptake compared to the rest of the country last one do we know how many people are in the 16 18 age group yeah i'll get that for you too i think it's um i don't remember uh exactly what it is but i'll get that to you as well thank you so much yeah i had a question um if we are looking at booster shots of the covid-19 vaccine um a year from now what might the outreach for that look like to try to get the strong turnout we're seeing right now um you know if an entire year goes by and i might not be top of mind as much for some people um you know if somebody had an account made with the vermona department of health website could that be used to then contact them again um and get that direct contact if they need the booster shot that has there been any thoughts on that i would imagine that we have a strategy in mind but dr levine can you answer that yeah first of all we should all hope that a year from now this is not the only thing we talk about and that it's not front page headlines all the time and we're tracking everything the same way we will still be tracking a lot but hopefully it will be a little more in the background um what you're missing in the question is the fact that probably sometime if i could guess over the summer um there's going to be a definite transition of vaccination strategy back to where it always has belonged which is in the healthcare community in the primary care and specialty care offices around the state that's the way vaccination has always been done for everything and that will still happen not to leave the pharmacies out the pharmacies will still be a core component of that strategy as they have become for many other vaccines but you will not have to see large vaccination sites that are coordinated through the registration system we're doing right now should a booster become part of our future it will be just like when you needed to get your flu shot every year you made a decision it was either in the context of having healthcare at a certain site and you just went to that site to get your flu shot or it was when you were going to have your other medical problems followed up on and they said you want your flu shot today and you said sure let's get it out of the way or you went to the pharmacy because that was the way you had traditionally done it so that's what will happen if and when boosters become the rule with COVID-19 thank you heard the first part of that um yeah hi um so the state's reopening guidelines for schools assume a three-fourth distance between students which is based on the you know CDC guidelines that say you know we can go from six to three feet however what the state's guidelines don't account for is that the CDC allows three feet a distance if and only if the risk of transmission is low based on cases and positivity rates and right now the CDC is saying that the risk of or level of community transmission in several counties is high is the state concerned about the CDC rating and that portion of the CDC guidelines are you are you adjusting for that fact at all in your guidance I've been asked Dr. Levine to answer that first and maybe secretary french afterwards yeah no one is ignoring that by any means and the way the CDC does it for the schools is similar to what they do for long-term care visitation which has to do with the percent positivity rate and there's different colors for different percents goal is clearly to be well under 10 percent and certainly well under 5 percent part of what you need to understand though is the concept again of looking ahead in time and where we're going to be at the time that this thing happens because what is true in terms of case numbers and positivity today we truly do anticipate is going to be different later in the school year of this this part of the school year the spring and certainly during the summer and then into the fall so again no one's got their head in the sand ignoring that part of the CDC guidance but it's again you have to plan and anticipate as well secretary french yeah I would I would just add we is to dr. Levine's point we certainly and his team analyzed that very closely it is an intersection of two variables in the CDC guidance around case counts per population size and also on positivity rate and then the guidance goes on to say if you pick the higher standard depending on which one is more relevant in that regard but I think it's also important to understand that we also increasingly rely on our experience and we have real-world data and Vermont was operating at three feet at the elementary level all fall well before the CDC moved its guidance so we we have an understanding of that and we have a keen understanding of how our schools are situated and their ability to implement guidance with fidelity which is also another important consideration so yeah we certainly took that into consideration analyze the reports behind the CDC recommendations that as dr. Levine mentioned also have to then translate that into a projection of where where the state will be in the coming weeks and do what we think is best for vermont's I'm not sure I understand are you saying that the fact that we don't currently meet that CDC guidance is okay because you predict that we will in the future not quite we evaluate the CDC recommendation as dr. Levine said you know and it is a recommendation so that's important to acknowledge but I would say that you know previously we were operating at a lower standard than the CDC recommended and we have real-world data suggests that that could be done safely and that's essentially in the conclusions of several of the studies and particularly the massachusetts study that was behind the CDC change in regulation that basically pointed to there's no significant difference between six and three feet so all that has to be taken together and evaluated and that's I would say you know what we've always done successfully to date is to to consider anything certainly from the CDC and other studies but then apply it to our real-world context of vermont so just to be clear even if you know even if the data or the numbers in vermont go much higher you're not going to kind of go back to six feet even even you know if the CDC guidelines would very much call for that under that incident because of the data in vermont yeah I don't think it's as simple as that we certainly wouldn't hesitate as we have in the past to modify our guidance if we thought it was necessary but I think you know it's also important to note that we have areas of state that are very sparsely populated so take Essex County as an example a couple you know increases there can really skew the sort of population counts per density basis so we just have to once again really understand the findings in the vermont context okay thank you hi good afternoon um in regards to opening up the the vaccination sign up a little bit early for people in in high school um you're talking about how there's a certain amount of health that you know a public health equity argument to be made since people 16 17 can only get one of the kinds of vaccines and you know and I'm wondering a little bit about an asset was made last week by restaurant workers to get vaccinated a little bit early and you know that tends to be a younger population who are more at risk of you know contacting people in the public and being exposed to the virus so I'm just I'm wondering sort of from an equity standpoint why you didn't prioritize public facing people like grocery store workers and restaurant workers but did for for younger high school students well again I think I explained that fairly well this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for them as they graduate from high school I'm sure you can relate to that probably better than I can you're probably closer to that memory than I am but that's a big point in your life and to to have an opportunity for us to allow that to happen for kids for a kid to be able to participate in their graduation have something normal in their lives after all they've given over the last 14 months seem to be you know a compassionate empathetic way of looking at this and and I understand the urgency of some from an economic standpoint to to have restaurant workers and retail workers get to the front of the line as well but we're not talking about that many people getting the front of the line here and again to make a difference in their lives is once in a lifetime opportunity I think it's a sacrifice that many would be willing to make but but that's that's our thought process I know that there's some who might disagree but that's the path we took you know I mean I I'm certainly a little bit closer I guess to my high school graduation and that once in a lifetime opportunity but I think you know a lot of these people the economic livelihood probably outweighs outweighs that are I think some might make that argument so you know and I and also just the amount of spread that has has been occurring recently I think do you think that the state could have maybe slowed the spread and we know that you know gaps are a lacking indicator as well I was wondering if there's an opportunity to reduce spread Liam I think I think we have to go back as well to looking at the data and the data really doesn't support that there is spread within the within restaurants at this point in time it seems elevated that the the transmission seems elevated because of the variance that we're seeing throughout all sectors at this point in time it's not just there in in the restaurants you could point to I look at the number of gatherings that I see on the epi epi report that that's where we're seeing a lot of the spread of these of the virus I see it in in all kinds of different businesses whether it be auto dealers or be it manufacturing or be it any type of of business so it's not pointing directly at restaurants and I think that that's the fallacy in the argument this is spread amongst the whole community of those from 16 to 30 at this point and we're opening that up on on Monday this is just to give a little bit of a head start to those who aren't going to have any choices and remember as well I mean the 16 to 18 year olds only have one choice that's Pfizer on Monday there's two choices there's you know I mean there'll be Moderna and Pfizer and hopefully by the end of the week there'll be another choice back to Johnson and Johnson so we'll see what happens but but again from an equity standpoint and trying to be sympathetic to those who may be able to to experience this again this milestone in their life after all they've given up over the last 14 months seems to be a price many would be able to to see the way in paying so I will see how it works out I don't again we'll get the numbers but I don't think it's going to be as big a number as might some might expect but but we just wanted to give that that opportunity to those who again sacrifice so much thank you hey governor I understand that h315 is sitting on your desk and I'm wondering what your plan is for it yeah I have until tomorrow to make up my mind on that there are a number of areas that are problematic within the bill but there are a lot of good aspects of the bill some of the some of which we asked for as you remember this was as a result of we had put some of these provisions in this budget adjustment back in January and the legislature decided to create another bill so they could put it through quick quickly and here we are you know two months two months later three months later talking about this bill and they it's been a bit of a Christmas tree there's a lot in there and and again as you well know one of those provisions is really contemplating the taxing of PPP loans and that's that's problematic from my standpoint the other is using some of the ARPA money that for different areas when we have no idea whether or not we can use it for that and so there's there's a lot of things in there that that I have problems with I'm going to reflect on that through the rest of the day and tomorrow and then come to a come to a conclusion and a decision now with the the PPP of course which is one of those problematic areas is that something that that that in a say in the budget bill that could be uh basically removed yes without having to yeah it could it can be and that's part of what I'm contemplating but uh I haven't received any assurances from the legislature that they're going to do that I've heard some say that it could be done I haven't had anyone tell me that's what will be done and there's a difference okay and with uh F10 which has the uh as you know the a lot of people are concerned about the the unemployment tax implications of that and which would boost the the trust fund to a billion dollars even though we're only have netted 300 million during the pandemic but is there any movement on that on on how to basically fix that that part yeah well there's a way to fix it um and that's the narrow the scope uh and I would advocate that they do that but you know I haven't been following that uh to be honest with you Tim I know it's in the house but I just haven't been following the bill okay all right I'm sure we'll hear more thank you governor Avery WCAX and we see more cases among children are any of the hospitalizations Vermont youth under the age of 16 I don't believe so but uh I'll let Dr. Levine answer that I can't be precise but I'm not aware of hospitalizations in that age group at this time okay um and I just have another question directly from a viewer emailed a 70-year-old Vermont or vaccinated just wants to know whether it's safe for them to even doors and whether you Dr. Levine yourself would even doors uh if you could in Vermont following all the restaurant guidelines obviously sure so um 70-year-old that's been fully vaccinated the low-hanging fruit is gather with other with other vaccinated people as a very safe activity can begin to gather with unvaccinated people uh one household at a time and use masks obviously whether vaccinated or unvaccinated is free to go to an indoor dining experience whether it's at someone's home or in a restaurant um knowing that um at this point in time no one has come up definitively saying that the transmissibility of virus from one person to another um is reduced by vaccination but we fully believe that's going to come about very soon because the data keeps accumulating in that direction um at this point in time there's a lot of virus around so I have to be honest uh I'm waiting for my favorite restaurants to have their outdoor experiences and under the tent experience which in spite of the weather today should be just around the corner so uh that that's what my preference would be but I could not tell somebody who's 70 and vaccinated that they should not go to a restaurant it's again their own personal level of comfort their own willingness to adhere to all of the guidance that we all provide all the time okay thank you thank you uh governor I have another um legislation question for you uh last night the legislature of the house uh passed through bill that had a um that included a uh ending the tax exemption on cloud computing services or software as a service but also restructured the corporate tax to move to a single factor um rather than um gross receipts rather than um property and payroll and also passed a $10,000 exemption for military retirees under benefits uh so there's a combination of things there and just wonder if if that's if that um survives the benefit and comes to your desk in that form how do you how would you uh balance those things out and do you think you'd sign it yeah um well has the long ways to go uh obviously uh a couple things I'm I'm opposed to uh a cloud tax um I don't think that uh a $10,000 exemption for military pensions is enough I think it should be a full exemption um and uh was the third one the third one was the change in the um the corporate tax factor from uh from payroll and uh property to uh gross receipts I I haven't looked at that aspect um but um but I we'll see where it goes when it goes to the to the senate but I I would say I have some problems with many aspects of the that bill yes I am thank I am thank you thank Jason um will you get your next update on where they're going with the Johnson and Johnson uh vaccine now if they're going to continue to pause it on Tuesday or will you possibly get any information before then um I don't think we'll get I mean we'll probably be updated with our White House call on Tuesday um but I don't think they will tell us anything conclusive at that point I don't believe they're meeting I've heard two separate uh scenarios I I'd heard that they were going to meet on Wednesday but I'm being told that it may be Friday so um I don't know as we'll know until the end of week before the advisory committee actually meets so they're the ones who are going to have to make a decision or a recommendation and then I'm not sure if it goes to the FDA and CDC because there's just an advisory panel but um I have as we've seen over the last number of months uh whatever the advisory panel does uh the CDC uh and the FDA uh follows suit okay thank you uh this one's a hard ball so brace yourself uh did Dr. Levine author the mask on faces six foot uh six foot faces I I don't know that's a better question for him the answer is no it takes a village to come up with things that are that powerful and we have an excellent communication team and marketing team uh who all contribute to that effort so it's a product of Vermont oh I would say yes okay that's all I have have a great weekend thank you Lisa the water very roundabout Jason can you hear me we can okay hi folks um that's a tough one to follow um I kind of want to pick up on where um Erin was asking about um the school question and and Governor Scott's theme of how you know the kids have paid a long price here for the last year or so um and we want to sort of finish on a good note especially with the older kids I suppose but there are students on vacation right now this week and then there are more going on vacation next week and they will be returning either Monday or a week from Monday back to their schools and in many cases especially the kids that are in seventh to 12th grade are going to be coming back to bigger classes at closer proximities because of the three foot rather than a six foot rule um but the I guess what I'm hearing a lot and people are looking for some reassurance and understanding and maybe Dr. Levine can explain if there's science behind this is the no quarantine and kids can come back to school um and get a test three days after they return from travel um there are families where adults are vaccinated and the kids aren't but they're going to go and visit grandparents and family members over their their spring breaks um so there's going to be kids coming back to school and not getting a test for a few days and maybe not getting the results for another day or so kind of circulating now in classrooms with even more of their peers who are not vaccinated um people are kind of scratching their heads wondering you know you trained us well on the seven day get a test after seven days so now it's it's less than half that time now can the can the test pick up whether someone has the virus after three you know with that three day wait um and what's the what's the risk here as far as you know it being elevated now with them being able to circulate without any you know staying home and waiting for a test Dr. Levine yes a lot of thought has gone into this I want people to be aware there are many states where there have never been any real travel policies in terms of quarantining or testing in or out of quarantine policies um and they actually many of them have had schools going for a long long time as well so with that as backdrop the reality is that we are still number one telling people very clearly that the universal guidance that we've talked about it is in place so little rhyme you just heard from the previous caller hasn't gone away and indeed if you're actually outside the borders of Vermont uh one needs to be potentially even more careful about adhering to that guidance knowing that the state may have different rules and regulations compared to what Vermont has so we're counting on people doing that as part of the way they vacation whether they're vacationing out of state or within the state that's very very important in addition to that yes you can pick up things three days after somebody's exposure we always are concerned about the fact that people may have been exposed in the two days prior to them being in contact with a person who was infective so adding that window of time in as well lengthens that a little bit people are not supposed to return to their work environment or school environment if they have any symptoms so whether you have obtained a test or not obtained a test whether the test is positive or negative if you have symptoms that are even close to COVID symptoms such as sneezing and runny nose and nasal congestion um you should avoid going back to the setting where you could potentially infect others so none of these things have changed at all the only thing that's changed is the absence of a quarantine requirement we are now amongst new england states still in the most aggressive if i could use that word for requirements on Vermonters coming back into the state in terms of having a testing requirement at all um and uh that kind of a travel policy so we feel pretty comfortable with that at this time okay that's helpful um i guess i was thinking more about the not so much workers um adult workers going back to their workplace etc but kids being um as asymptomatic as they've shown to be that it's kind of hard to know they may not have symptoms but they could potentially have been exposed um or even have the virus you know be carrying the virus at that point um before they're tested and so um it just sort of is a little bit more of an unknown i suppose until they're able to get their tests and hope that they're um i guess they're still using the masking strategies in school and some distancing as well to try to reduce their contact with other people yeah no no and i can extend my discussion to them as well because uh as secretary french has provided each week with his astonishingly low levels of positivity rates in the tests of school employees they are one of the most um careful populations living in the state i would contend uh even though we're not testing every one of them all of the time we're getting a good sample from the pre-vaccine era into the vaccine era now and we're finding very very low rates so assuming all of their care and be careful behaviors continue through the spring break which i have no doubt they would i think that also is on everyone's side i don't know if secretary french wants to add to anything i've said now i think you know dr. oveanie covered it it is um you know it's a challenging time period i think you know to bring together uh the changes in guidance with the operational realities today and you know again i just harken back to the fact that we've we've navigated several of these sort of transition periods throughout this year we've done it well uh there's always times of almost a turbulence of difficulty and implementation when we come to one of these transition points and we're clearly in it now um but i again i would just point to our demonstrated uh track record of operating our school safely and it does require all hands on deck to do so but we pull together as a state to sort of do that very well from my perspective and in secretary french when as you're talking about writing out the turbulence if after the schools reopen after their break periods whether it's in the next week or the week after if they see that there are cases popping up um among their their students given some of these changes that are implementing they have the ability to at that point reassess correct as far as like how they're how they're conducting their their operations whether they're still doing the three feet or six feet or whether they're remote or or not no really they're you know they're sort of tactical controls around their operations you know and staff availability and so forth all those logistic pieces but we've made that distinction all along again a sort of a key ingredient of our successes that we have been very directive on what are the sort of non-negotiable health standards that all schools must follow but we do defer to them on how that gets implemented to a certain extent particularly on how it impacts their daily operations but i think again you know just looking at sort of reflecting back on these moments where we've had transition i think that you know the big the big point now is that we have the vaccine and we have real science and data behind the vaccine and we can see that in data from other places in the world like Israel where you know vaccine has made a significant impact on the trajectory of case count so we know with significant confidence i think that in spite of the variant activity as Dr. Levine mentioned we know there's going to be a significant decrease in case counts here and certainly we have been hoping for that to start sooner but it's inevitable i think you know from my perspective that as we get closer and closer to that 50 60 70 vaccination rate that our communities will become much safer and therefore our schools will become much more safer but i think we're on the right track and it's just it's just a challenging moment as we make the transition and guide so we appreciate that and i know everyone's working together to make it work for people okay thank you um have a good weekend everyone all right thank you very much and we'll see you again on tuesday have a wonderful weekend