 Yeah, feel free. Well, good morning, everyone. As the global outbreak of coronavirus or COVID-19 continues to develop and federal guidance is shifting from containment to mitigation, we know Vermonters have growing concerns about what this means to them and have many questions. So we thought it was important to update you on the current status here in Vermont. Our ongoing current circumstances as well as ensuring we're prepared if larger or longer term measures become necessary and answer questions based on the information we have in this quickly evolving situation. Members of my team from the Department of Health emergency management and the Agency of Education will get into more detail in a minute. But first, I want to thank the agency and department leaders and the many state employees who are working behind the scenes day in and day out to keep Vermonters safe and plan for anything that comes our way. I also want to thank my colleagues, governors across the country for working together in a truly nonpartisan way to share information on this complex and fluid issue, as well as the Trump administration and Congress, including our delegation for acting so quickly to provide the funding we know we're going to need. I was especially grateful for the lengthy call I had yesterday with Senator Leahy who assured me the funding and the flexibility that we, the governors have asked for was going to be included in this bill. And I also heard from Congressman Welch on this very issue as well. We're joined today by representatives from our congressional delegation, John Tracy and Diane Derby from Senator Leahy's office, Catherine Becker Van Haste of Senator Sanders' office, and Tiffine Dean of Congress and Welch's office. Finally, and most importantly, I want to thank Vermonters for their understanding and attention to this issue and their cooperation in following CDC and Vermont Health Department guidance to ensure we do all we can to avoid as much spread as possible here in Vermont. Please know we are ready to respond if it does spread because we have to be realistic. Given the global and national cases we're seeing, it's only a matter of time. I'll turn this over to Dr. Levine, Commissioner of the Department of Health. Thank you Governor Scott. As I'm sure you're all aware, this is an evolving national and local situation in the past 48 hours. The number of U.S. cases that have been reported has escalated to the number 159 and the number of deaths has increased to 11, the majority of those in the long-term care facility in Washington State. And there are increasing numbers of cases that reflect either person to person transmission or that remain under investigation for the source of their exposure. I have no doubt that we'll continue to see these numbers escalate beyond where they are now. And as you know, though we have no laboratory confirmed cases in Vermont, we are surrounded by states as well as the province of Quebec that have all reported cases. In my view, the reason for these changes and statistics relates to several items. First of which is the national change and approach to screening of returning travelers, especially from South Korea and Italy. It's really unclear if the nation could have attempted to screen the literally tens of thousands of travelers per day arriving from such higher risk destinations. Many of those travelers were potentially incubating their illnesses. I want to reassure you that during that time period, the Health Department was actively involved in working with returning travelers who identified themselves to us on a voluntary basis, or in the case of students whose schools identified that returning students were arriving. And they communicated with us also since our last press conference at the end of last week and the public messaging that came from that. The other reason that we've seen an uptick in cases has to do with a change in laboratory testing policies, which I'll get to in a second. I thought it was important just for remoders to understand what this illness is, because there is so much press about it right now and sometimes some of the easy details get lost. So what are the symptoms? The majority of people will have a fever, the majority of people will have a dry cough. Those who may get more significantly ill may have symptoms such as shortness of breath and malaise. It's important to know at our current state of knowledge about this virus that has never infected humans before, as far as we're aware, that greater than 80 percent of the humans that have contracted the virus have had what would be termed a mild or moderate illness. Certainly not one requiring hospitalization. So it is the minority that have had more severe symptoms and required more medical intervention. It's also important to know that the reports that just were published coming out of China does mirror some of the experience we're seeing around the world where it's very unusual for the pediatric population to be affected. And in fact the initial report from China there were no individuals ages 15 or below included in their series of almost 500 patients. The other thing about this virus to put it in a little bit of context is obviously it is contracted by respiratory droplets. So human to human transmission is possible through respiratory droplets. Which is why we spend so much time talking about what individuals can do to both protect themselves and to protect others that are around them. And I will detail those in a moment. It's believed that the, I'll call it the zone of concern, is six feet from a person. I'm only saying that not because we have the greatest accuracy in our knowledge of the virus about it, but because of the fact that a condition like measles, one could be in a room this size and as far away as I am from the other wall. And if there was a case of measles in the room and the person was actively symptomatic, one could contract the measles from that person. Perhaps up to a hundred feet. There's also a growing body of knowledge about how long does this virus last on human surfaces, on other non-human surfaces. And unlike measles, it may not last as long. More in the realm of minutes. I want to segue now to talking about travelers because that's so important. And as of yesterday, the Centers for Disease Control, which I'll refer to as the CDC, issued a travel health alert notice instructing returning travelers from what are termed level three countries that includes China of course, but also South Korea, Iran, and Italy to stay home when they return for 14 days and self-monitor their conditions and of course connect with their health departments. The instructed travelers from level two countries which is predominantly Japan to monitor their health and limit interactions, but not to self-isolate in the way I just described. New guidance has also been provided to schools from the CDC regarding limiting student travel because this time of year, especially that question is coming up in countless Vermont and other national locations. To date, we have successfully completed monitoring of 20 Vermonters. The predominant number were in that wave that came from China. US citizens being repatriated, so to speak, from China. Their 14-day period is now over. As of this morning, we are currently monitoring 156 Vermonters and that number has grown substantially in the last number of days. Again, this is a vacation time and a lot of traveling is occurring. So as I've mentioned, there's been an uptick in identification of cases across the US, partially due to the travels, but also due to laboratory testing. States as of just earlier this week now have capability to do in-house laboratory testing at the Public Health Labs. Prior to this, all test samples had to be sent to the CDC. Our first results came online Tuesday. In the last three days, we reported out five negative COVID-19 results. And as we speak, testing is in process for another seven persons under investigation, one of whom is being tested through the New Hampshire Public Health Lab, for reasons I'll get to in a moment. Under my direction, the Health Department has initiated a new testing policy, which is less restrictive than the original policy of the CDC at the time all specimens needed to be sent directly to the CDC lab. Under this new policy, individuals who have the requisite symptoms, fever and cough or shortness of breath, and travel history or contact exposure history, but are not ill enough to require hospitalization, are being tested. Prior to this time, in addition to all those aspects of the case definition, one needed to be hospitalized. I'm confident we will have positive results. I am sure you are all aware of the news from New Hampshire regarding the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center physician trainee who has tested positive and was at a social function in White River Junction, Vermont, while awaiting his test result. A second close contact to that physician also tested positive. We are awaiting the result of the Dartmouth Hitchcock employee who resides in Vermont that was tested. Our health department has been in close contact with the establishment that the social function was at regarding contact exposure, the relatively low risk of most of the social function attendees and staff that they should enjoy and the appropriate cleaning protocols. And our public health epidemiologists are working very closely with those in New Hampshire. Now, because there is no medication or vaccine at this time to treat COVID-19, the health department continues to strongly prescribe what are termed non-pharmaceutical interventions. Things that Vermonters can do every day and be conscious of at all times. You've heard these before, but they're worth repetition. These include staying at home if you are sick, avoiding people who are sick, following what we call proper respiratory etiquette in terms of coughing in the tissues, sleeves. Focusing more than ever on hand washing and in the absence of soap and water use of hand sanitizers. But hand washing with soap and water comes first. And of course obtaining a flu shot if you've not yet obtained one because the flu is still prevalent in Vermont at this time. These actions will of course be supplemented by voluntary home isolation in the circumstances I talked about earlier. The other set of non-pharmaceutical interventions are termed community interventions which include social distancing such as avoiding mass gatherings and things like school closures. None of these are needed at this time in Vermont and you'll hear more about them later. In terms of communication strategies we continue to have our website updated daily and our website is directly aligned with the CDC so that any changes on their website will be reflected quickly on our website. We've also had press releases and press conferences like today and it's especially important to note that so much of the information is new such as the travel alert and the laboratory testing protocol. We continue to coordinate with New Hampshire. We'll be putting out another health alert notification as early as possible today to the entire health provider community and we'll be communicating directly with the hospital system, the organizations for physicians within the state as well and with EMS providers. Yesterday we provided guidance to all long-term care facilities because as you are aware the elderly and those who are compromised in their health are the highest risk for serious illness or death from this virus and that's what has played out in Washington state. So in conclusion the health department will continue to expand monitoring of travelers and contacts, facilitate testing on a broader population who fulfill the criteria that I have mentioned, communicate with all of the audiences I just discussed and certainly the public and provide guidance to targeted populations. I believe I'll be taking questions at the conclusion of the conference. I'd like to introduce Erica Borneman now. Good morning and thank you Dr. Levine. My name is Erica Borneman. I'm the director of Vermont Emergency Management. Last week at the direction of Governor Scott, Vermont Emergency Management assembled an interagency task force to develop a comprehensive COVID-19 response plan that will support the overall public health response being led by the Department of Health. The state emergency management plan is the framework for all state emergency response for all hazards and is updated regularly. That plan has multiple annexes that address various hazards that are identified as possible in Vermont including pandemics. We are using those existing plans and federal guidance on COVID-19 as a new virus in developing the COVID-19 response plan. This response plan will take into consideration community interventions and mitigation measures that may or may not be necessary if widespread transmission occurs as well as continuity planning guidance to state agencies. The task force is also responsible for ensuring regular communication of the status of COVID-19 response is provided to state government leadership on a regular basis so they can stay informed and make appropriate decisions from the agencies that are involved in the response. The task force is meeting today as the first meeting with representatives from the Vermont Department of Public Safety, Health, Human Resources, Building and General Services, Agencies of Education and Human Services, Vermont National Guard, Vermont Health Care Emergency Preparedness Coalition, E911 Board, Governor's Emergency Preparedness Advisory Council and the Federal Emergency Management Agency as well as the Vermont League of Cities and Towns. This is very similar to other planning efforts that are undercaken for other types of hazards in Vermont and is done in consistency with the state emergency management plan. With that, I will turn it over to Secretary French from the Agency of Education. Good morning. I'm Dan French, the Secretary of Education. The Agency of Education has been working very closely with the Department of Health and local school officials to provide guidance on managing the COVID-19 outbreak. Our guidance is communicated through our website, our weekly field memo and in direct communications with school superintendents. Our initial guidance focused on sharing the current CDC and Vermont Department of Health recommendations on personal protective measures that we can all use to slow the spread of the virus, such as washing our hands and staying at home if we're sick. We currently updated that guidance to address questions pertaining to the disinfection measures. These recommended measures include disinfecting frequently touched surfaces, such as bathrooms, nurses, offices, cafeterias, drinking fountains and door handles in schools. We are in the process of drafting guidance on school closures. School closures can be an important tool to slow the outbreak of the virus, such as COVID-19, but are only implemented in severe outbreaks. We do not believe school closures are necessary at this time. Our forthcoming guidance will address how the decision to close the school will be made and if such a decision becomes necessary. It will also address the provision of student meal programs and when a school is closed and how student attendance and school calendar requirements will be addressed. I have underscored in my communications with superintendents that the role of the agency of education is to support them in their communities. Our guidance will continue to evolve based on their needs and the latest information from the CDC and the Vermont Department of Health. Thank you. And with that, we'd be happy to answer any questions you might have on this subject. Dr. Levine, you talked about that six foot zone. What should the monitors do with that information? Should I not shake the governor's hand when I see him, should I not hug him? What should we do? Excellent question. So actually, the custom of handshaking is probably going to fade away as a result of this crisis. I'm not sure that will be a permanent situation, but I think most people now will be it will be socially acceptable to do other forms of communication, whether it be elbow to elbow or what happened. So that's really important. What was the other part of your question? Other way of hugging things like that. So yeah, so again, are you doing this? Are you not shaking the governor's hand? You know, since I've been employed in this job, every time I see the governor, even though we know each other, we shake hands. We haven't done that this week. Can you talk about hospital preparedness? Dr. Levine, it's the supply of respirators, the supply of masks and other things. Yeah, great question. And Eric, and they want to help you with this as well. But the fact of the matter is, we were on a phone call yesterday with the CEO of the UVM Medical Center Health Network. They are confident that they have the requisite supply at this point in time. There's also a stockpile that they can drop on. There is an opportunity, if it needed to be taken advantage of, for them to internally move patients from their new wing, which has rooms that can be essentially converted into ICU rooms, should they run out of ICU rooms and need more rooms as well as ventilators. And of course, we also have intensive care capacity at several of the other hospitals in the state, both in the south and in the central Vermont. So you believe there's enough capacity? With the current state of disease activity and what we know is going on even around the country where there's more activity, I would say yes. I mean, that's obviously could change. But even when I read about what's happening in countries that got this before us, there have a lot of concerns, but I've not seen panic about that chain of supply. China did actually put up sort of mobile hospitals very quickly, but they had in their epicenter such a tremendous volume of cases, and that's not being replicated everywhere. There's also the issue, I think your question raised on personal protective equipment like masks. So everyone's aware, both in Vermont as well as beyond the borders of Vermont, that nationally there's a shortage. Many of the supplies actually come from China. We've learned that China's cases, the increased number of cases they were having on a day to day basis has sort of plateaued and maybe gone down somewhat. And we're hearing that there are industries in China that actually are up and running now, that weren't up and running at the height of their epidemic. We have a stockpile here in Vermont also that we've released 50% of for the use of hospitals, and now reserving the other 50% as we monitor this case. We've had calls, I took one this morning from one of them who's freaking out because she cannot find any of those paper masks in the drugstore. She's been to paint shops and they don't have any in the San Jose area either. Do we need to have them? Good, so I said I'm really happy you asked that question because I've been talking about masks for healthcare personnel as part of what we call PPE, personal protective equipment. There is currently no evidence that a member of the well public is going to reduce their chances of contracting this virus by walking around with a mask on. Nonetheless, if there's a member of the ill public who's actively coughing and have left their home and are in a place where they could potentially be in contact with other members of the public, it is fine for them to be wearing a mask and they should be. Also gives me a chance to discuss what the term self-isolation means. If the travel health alert is telling people who come back from say Italy to basically get off the plane and go home and not leave for 14 days, what does that mean? And it really does mean stay isolated in their home for 14 days. We have been counseling people already in Vermont as you know to do that based on where they traveled from and the fact of the matter is we've gotten a great amount of cooperation. We have told people if they want to go behind their house in the woods and take a walk in the woods and they feel well enough to do that, they can probably do that but we don't want them going to work. We don't want them going to the grocery store. We don't want them picking up their prescriptions at the drug store that will have to be done by alters. That's a voluntary thing. I mean like there's not a way that you're going to help people to do this. Exactly. And my understanding is when you get off the plane you'll be handed a special card with instructions to do what I just said and to contact your help. Is there a discussion about making some of these things compulsory at all? Like isolation compulsory? Yes. So at the national level that has not come across. They have powers to do that if they choose to do that but that is not the case. Do you have powers to do that? If we needed to we could, yes. We've had it, as I said we've had a tremendous level of cooperation from Vermonters to date and I would think we would continue to. I heard a news piece this morning from Massachusetts that was interviewing several people who had been under the same circumstances in that state. And one of the nice aspects of the interview was the thought that, number one, people actually understand how bad this could get and they don't want to be actively infecting others. But number two, we should thank them. And we should definitely overtly recognize the fact that they are sacrificing for the greater good. And I would say that to all of Vermonters who have already abided by the protocols we've helped them with. We thank them tremendously. And as you know, though I expect we will have a positive case in Vermont, so far we have not had a laboratory confirmed case. So when we do, what will that person need to do? What will we tell them? Like for example, in the Dartmouth case, he was told to stay home, right? Right. So it's, I'm not betraying any confidentiality. In the news everyone knows that in the Dartmouth case, the individual went against the recommendation to wait for their test results before mingling in the public. We won't have that problem with a positive case. People will, when they're already known to be positive, probably you're not feeling well, but also you'll abide by the rules that we've talked about. If you're not symptomatic, again, we, it is voluntary cooperation, but we've been getting that. Does the state have any different authority when dealing with private schools versus public schools and sort of rolling out how to deal with COVID-19? I'll let Secretary Shrance. Yeah, our good question in terms of our regulatory authority. Yeah, we have greater regulatory authority over the public system for sure. But our guidance is being disseminated for all schools, K-12, public sand and everything. And if a student does contract COVID-19, what does that process look like within public schools and dealing with that internally? Yeah, as Dr. Levine mentioned, I mean, the students would fall into the same guidance as an adult in terms of staying home and so forth. You know, in the echo in Dr. Levine's comments, schools have done a great job of forwarding information to us. We've learned a lot about travel patterns and so forth of families and students from information being fed to us from the school districts. It's the same protocol for students as it would be for students. And you mentioned that we are not canceling any schools yet. But when do we sort of make that determination? Like, where is that threshold? Yeah, I think hopefully it'll be based on, you know, a better understanding of the virus and its contagion patterns in Vermont. But where we feel compelled it now based listening to school leaders and communities that we need to get some guidance out soon about that, you know, just to set, firstly, the common understanding of how the decisions will be made under what circumstances, precisely to your point. But we feel an urgency to do that in the coming week. So when there is a case, and this might be for Dr. Levine, when there is a case, what sort of information will the Vermont Department of Health release about that person? I know that there's privacy concerns, but people will probably want to know, is it a community transmission? Did this person travel? Where is this happening? Will that be available? So we will release the fact that it was from a traveler, perhaps, if that's a circumstance. We will not do anything to betray the health privacy of that individual, including their geographic location in the state. Vermont is a very small state, and it's just very impossible, once you say, well, this person came from whatever town to protect that individual. Dr. Levine. And you have to realize, what comes with becoming a case, a laboratory-confirmed positive case, is all of the resources that the Health Department brings to bear, which includes the goal of contact tracing, either reassuring or hopefully not concerning individuals about their level of risk because they came in contact with the person who was a case. So it's not like we need to identify to the press and to the public at large every case that happens because we will be doing our work behind the scenes to make sure that we can protect the health of anyone else who is not a case. Dr. Levine, so there's a lot of comparison to this virus with the flu. So how much worse is it than the flu? And is it more or less or more concern than the flu? And why? All along, for the last number of weeks, we've been saying that if you have these symptoms, you're much more likely in Vermont to have the flu or another respiratory virus, not this newer virus. And there's still plenty of that around, so we're still concerned about that. The symptoms can be confused because they're respiratory viruses. So it's hard to know without appropriate testing which virus you have. And the flu has a very, very low case fatality rate. And we're still working out the specifics of what the case fatality rate is for this virus. We don't believe it's real high, but at the same time, it's probably higher than the flu. And the reason we have trouble determining it is it seems that there are a lot of people with either mild illness or very few symptoms so that when you try to figure out how many people are dying compared to how many people have the illness, that denominator is probably much larger than we understand. And in the latest literature that came out from the New England Journal last week, people are estimating, scientific authorities, I should say, are estimating under 1%, but probably not as low as the flu, which I believe Dr. Kelso is here, our state epidemiologist, about 0.1%. So larger than 0.1%, smaller than 1%. But again, the reason that as Vermonters all having Vermont in common, we need to take heed to those individual kind of precautions I mentioned about what we can do. Because it is the elderly, it is those who have chronic illnesses or are immunocompromised that will suffer if we don't. So we can really impact whatever illness levels or mortality levels could occur by just doing all of the right things. I'm going back to capacity. Some of the hospitals have talked about negative pressure rooms. I wonder if you could address what context those would be used in and what sort of capacity hospitals have in the state for those. And what happens if that capacity gets saturated? Yeah, so I have no doubt that capacity would get saturated in terms of negative pressure rooms. But that does not have to be the standard of care for this. I mean, it would be ideal. But at the same time, as long as all the healthcare personnel have the appropriate personal protective equipment, I think we'd be doing fine. So what's the potential cost to the patients when it comes to being infected? It's not like you stay home when you have a flu, like some people, no many people do. You'll have to go to a hospital or an emergency room or something like that. What about the costs of all those things? I don't know. I was happy if you can contract with me, please. You have insured people, you have non-insured people. I mean, what? Yeah, actually, did you want to help us? How do we pay for them? Yeah, we've actually thought about that tremendously. And there is actually no charge. There is no charge to a patient for this test that we're talking about. But Secretary Mike Smith of the Agency of Human Services can talk to the cost issue in general because we've been engaged in discussions about that just for that reason. And I can't again overemphasize the importance of planning. And so all of these conversations have been occurring over weeks, whether it be costs, whether it be what Erica is doing in Vermont Emergency Management, planning about schools, planning about mass gatherings, planning for things that may never happen. But unless you've done the planning, you don't have the ability to quickly implement things. Especially about personal costs. We're looking at personal costs right now. In fact, we're in the planning stages of trying to figure out a mechanism to make sure that people on Medicaid or commercial insurance are not charged a copay for anything that is related to this specific virus. I think we'll have more to come in the next few days. But I just wanted to alert you that that's coming down the pike as well. Probably one more question for Secretary French as well. There's probably a lot of parents that are concerned about sending their kids to school during this time. I guess what's your message to concerned parents? Yeah, at this point, as I mentioned, we don't anticipate needing to close schools at the moment, but that thinking will evolve as the virus evolves. But I would encourage them to work closely with their principals and their teachers and the trust of people they work with on a daily basis. We're endeavoring to ensure that they have the best guidance in their hands and they're able to provide that to parents. This might be more of a question for the governor or maybe the Department of Justice. Can I just finish the response to the previous question though? The two things. Number one, hospitalization is not going to be the most common outcome of contracting this virus. So though we do have to be concerned about capacity on all of these issues, remember that well over 80% of individuals are going to have a milder or more moderate degree of illness. And then secondly, remember that the youth population seems to be the least affected, at least in the places that have had significant illness spread through their populations. Commissioner, you mentioned the older part of folks. Is that following up this? Because I did interrupt his question. Oh, that means I was going to say this is probably more of a question of her Department of Public Safety or maybe the governor. But so in the White River Junction case, the person, of course, didn't go into quarantine by choice. And can they face legal repercussions or negligence or something like that from us? Yeah, that's something well out of my realm of knowledge at this point in time. I think that's more of a question for them in that region. I wanted to ask about capacity. I heard yesterday that there were, the state had 250 test kits, which doesn't seem like that many. So I'm wondering if that, when that will change and if you're worried about that capacity. Yeah, I'll let Dr. Levine or make the pass. Dr. Kelly. Thank you. Yeah, that's the number we currently have. We expect to get more. We're ordering more reagents and should have more next week. Right now, our lab has the personnel capacity to do plenty of tests. We could do 26 every day if we had that many to test. And by next week, we think we'll be able to do over 50 a day and then more beyond that. Right now, reagents are not a limiting factor, but that may change. Okay. What about in the rural parts of the state in terms of isolation rooms and that kind of thing? Like what will, what's the protocol for people who are sick in the Northeast Kingdom, say? So I'll defer to Dr. Levine, but we do know at the health department that there are about 80 isolation rooms in the state. So, we're not talking about one or two at each of our 14 hospitals. There are more than that. Commissioner, you mentioned the older folks being more susceptible to this. Vermont nursing homes already have a worker shortage. Have you heard of any nursing home workers calling out at greater levels because of this? I've not heard of it from calling out at greater levels. I would significantly expect any profession to have people calling out at this time of year because of the flu prevalence and other viruses. And as I mentioned earlier, we did come out with very specific guidance for long-term care facilities yesterday, just to help them take all the appropriate precautions, which of course includes making sure their workforce doesn't feel obligated to come to work when they might be ill. Okay. Thank you. Is there any nursing grandma at the nursing home since they're the most vulnerable? Is there any? There are also guidelines in there about visiting. Can you visit grandma? You don't look ill to me right this moment. I'm not. Let me put your camera back. Yeah, no, that's the kind of guidance though. It's a common sense guidance. Doesn't mean we should forbid people from going into the nursing homes to visit, but we've got to make sure that people don't introduce things if they're feeling ill. What is the time or distance between testing and result? I'm going to give you an approximate. It's around 24 hours. So it was in that 24-hour period that the Dartmouth employee went to the White River Junction. Exactly. He got tested that day. The result would have come back subsequent and he chose to go home. What is his condition now? Can you tell us? I actually, you'd have to ask the New Hampshire Department of Health. I don't know. Patsy, what's being done in the White River Junction area, about 175 or so people who were at that gathering, that you had to track down a guest list? What epidemiological work is happening? That's exactly what we're doing. We're working closely with the New Hampshire Department of Health and because it was an event organized by people from New Hampshire, so they have the guest list. Most of the attendees were New Hampshire residents, but some were Vermont and some of the small number of employees are also Vermont residents. So we've been in touch with many of them and recommending that they self-monitor for symptoms for 14 days after the event. Have you been able to reach them all? We have been able to reach everyone. We have contact information for. There may still be a few attendees who we haven't gotten contact information for, but my team is working on that. Do you want to speak a little bit more about the collaboration that you have with the state of New Hampshire? Sure, we work together all the time on all kinds of things, whether it's a TB case or a foodborne disease outbreak, and we have good communication with them. It just so happens that the state epidemiologist in New Hampshire sent me a text as soon as he knew something was going on and we've been communicating by text and email and phone since then, as well as his staff working with my staff. Do you know the condition of the conversation? I do not. And I've been in contact constantly with my counterpart in New Hampshire as well. And it should be noted that, we'll call this individual the index case, has been very forthcoming about who they have close contact with. And so that enabled the Department of Health in New Hampshire to do the appropriate testing of individuals who would be at highest risk. And to do, frankly, the appropriate reassuring of the vast majority of people who are at the facility who could consider themselves at lower risk. I did promise to get Dr. Kelso out of here for another previously scheduled interview, so she just has to leave momentarily if you have any questions. I also had that Governor Sununu had called me first thing on Tuesday morning and let me know of the situation to give me an update and a heads up so that we could react accordingly. And the Dartmouth employee lives in Vermont or was that the second person in there? Oh, I thought you mentioned someone who lived in Vermont. There's one of the people who were tested. Oh, okay. Who lives in Vermont. Okay. Governor, I have a question about the economic impact. The clerk of the house came up to the press gallery and told us we were typing too loud so I went to Staples to buy a new Chromebook computer. I'm still using the old one because the coronavirus, they told me it's Staples. They didn't have any of the Chromebook, either HP or Acer computers. Are you seeing anything like that in terms of product availability and manufacturing parts, that's what I think? Yeah, I have no doubt that we will in time, as was mentioned before, many of the masks are made and manufactured in China. So we're seeing a shortage of them. So maybe some of this applies as well. So I have no doubt that we'll see some effects of this. I think on the federal level, they've noticed that as well and they've taken action to do things a little bit differently. But we'll see where this goes. But this is certainly a worldwide issue. Kelly, do you have any message for travelers and tourists coming up here to go skiing from, you know, areas down south that have coronavirus? Yeah, we've been fortunate thus far. We have no known cases in Vermont and we're taking this seriously. We're monitoring, doing the best we can. But we still have snow here in Vermont. We welcome people to come visit our state, our beautiful state and should feel safe in doing so. How much exposure though do we have given travelers our second biggest industry this summer? Worried about it? Well, we'll see where this goes, obviously. But at this point in time, it might be safer to travel within the U.S. than outside the U.S. And certainly in the Northeast in Vermont looks as though we thus far have avoided some of the areas of outbreak that other parts of the country have faced. You're asking state agencies not to attend conferences? We have not at this point in time, but we have given guidance to employees. We want to be sensitive to how they're feeling. We're not forcing anyone to go to any conferences and if they don't feel safe in doing so, we will make other arrangements and we don't have to go to conferences. We can stay here in Vermont. Have you talked to customs up on the border in Quebec about their protocols for allowing people in? We have made some contact with the border patrol and others, it's been one of my concerns. We're so close to the border and interact with those coming through Montreal in particular. So we've been in contact with them. What are they telling you? Well, there's a certain protocol in terms of those coming from China or Iran. They are prevented unless they're citizens of the country aren't allowed to come in. They're turned away at the border and we're, I'm sure we'll be seeing more in terms of those traveling to other areas like South Korea and Italy, but at this point in time, it's advisory only. On the governor, some businesses have posted signs on their doors telling people who are sick not to come and go to there. So what do you have to say to that? Well, I think we all have to take some responsibility. I think it's really important that we take care of ourselves, take care of our family, so make sure that we're not spreading this virus anymore. And if we knowingly are sick, stay home, stay away and let's make sure that we keep this state as safe as it is today. Is all the testing being done by the Department of Health or can hospitals start to test? That's a better question for Dr. Levine, but I believe everything is being done here in the state other than I think one case was mentioned in New Hampshire. But then they have to be confirmed by the federal government as well. This isn't the final destination. We can only give a positive test result and then pass it on to the federal government, but I don't believe that they're doing it in hospitals at this point in time, unless I'm missing something. No, you're correct. It's all state public health laboratories. They're envisioning the possibility that private laboratory companies will develop a test that could be used in healthcare settings. That is not prime time today here. Where are the test kits being distributed around healthcare centers? The specimens are being collected at hospitals and other places, right? All of the clinical facilities have materials they need to obtain the specimen, so it's really then when it comes to the health laboratory what we need to run the specimen. Okay, my co-worker just messaged me. He's at Fannie Allen Health Urgent Care. And we think he has the flu, we hope he just has the flu. But he said that they told him they have no test kits. They have no way to test there and that he would have had to go to the medical center. Well, that means the medical center is probably using special rooms to obtain those specimens, but it's not the kit necessarily, it's the location. Can you talk a little bit about election day before you look around? Does this be the time? Which election day would you like to talk about? A couple of days ago. Okay. I know it's been nine school budgets defeated so far. Are we moving on? Yeah, are there any other questions about coronavirus? Yeah, I mean just a couple more if that's all right. Let's do that first. In terms of some California, they had 54 cases and declared a state of emergency. I mean, they're a lot bigger than we are and 54 seems like kind of a small number. So do you have a sense of what the threshold would be in Vermont for you to be declaring something? Yeah, I mean, obviously we are watching what happens in our state and we'll make a determination whether we activate our emergency operations center as a result, but we're not at that point right now. But we'll be monitoring on a daily basis. They made the decision in California and that's their ability to do so. But here in Vermont, we'll continue to just see where we go from here. Do you know what that threshold might be? It's not going to be a threshold from my standpoint. It won't be a threshold of numbers. It might be hotspots. It might be other areas that we have some concern. But I'll let our director, director Borenman, talk about this as well. Yeah, thank you, governor. And this is part of the work of the task force, which is to work closely with the Department of Health to define those indicators that would help us as decision makers to assess what types of measures would be necessary at what point, whether they are voluntary or compulsory and to assess what types of authorities exist to be able to support those measures. And the task force is meeting today for the first time. This situation changes pretty quickly. So I mean, how quickly are you going to be making decisions with the task force? I mean, it seems like it's a really big group. There's a lot of stakeholders. So do you think it can be nimble enough to respond when the situation might be different in a couple of hours from where we're even talking about? So your question brings up a point that I really want to emphasize, which is the task force does not take the place or replace the public health response that is going on right now. The task force is a planning cell to develop a plan should we see a more widespread outbreak in Vermont and to give us the tools to be able to assess what measures might be put in place and at what time. So certainly the task force is nimble enough to ensure that that plan is put in place in a short order. And as with all of our plans, it gives us the authorities and the measures and the tools with which to work with and aid decision makers in making the most effective and pertinent decision at the time. Other questions on coronavirus election day? Your vote, yeah. Unless you want to answer any questions on election day. So it looks like we had about 10% of the school budgets fail. You might want to stay. Nine went down a little more than we've seen in the last couple of years. Do you read anything into that? Well, what I read is that people are concerned about their property taxes, obviously. We saw where our budget is increasing. Our projected budget would be revenue, the expenditures would have been about 87 million in terms of spending as an additional spending from last year. So that's a concerning number. That's $1.8 billion. And I think that Vermonters are concerned about the affordability of our state. I think the VPR poll showed that the number one issue that Vermonters are concerned about is the economy and affordability. So property taxes are a big part of that. And when you look at some of the budgets that were being put forth, obviously South Burlington was in large respect, I believe, turned down because of the capital expenditure, the $210 million school, new school. So I think, again, I think people are concerned about what it costs us to live in the state. That's why we're working so hard to find ways to grow the economy and work on issues that will help us accomplish that. Well, 79% of voters of South Burlington said no to that fund. They're saying anything like that? That's pretty resounding. So no, I have not seen anything to that degree. Which tells you? Which tells me they certainly did not want their taxes to go up. Are you gonna draw a line in the sand this year when it comes to property taxes? Is there a level of increased property taxes, property tax rates that you won't be able to accept in a budget? Yeah, I mean, I think we went through that in my first two years. And certainly on the local level, voters are showing that the small numbers that come. And again, this was a big year in terms of town meeting day. And I think there's 40% average turnout, which doesn't say a lot in terms of those who participate in that process. Because I hear a lot of people complaining about their property taxes and the spending that goes on. But when it comes right down to it, they're not showing up at the polls to show their opposition. So until that happens, we'll have to live by what they're promoting. When we were looking in December, it was going to be about a 9 cent increase, I believe. But that has decreased since then. So it's getting more reasonable than it once was, but still higher than it should be. So what are your expectations for the legislature next week when they're back rested and tanned from vacation? And you didn't express great satisfaction with the first half. Well, no, I just wanted them, I have a lot of concerns about the state and I have a lot of concerns about the affordability and growing this economy. And when I look at what we did in the first half again, it's a full game. We're only at halftime. There's plenty of time to move forward on some of the initiatives that I think are so important to the state. So I have great faith in the legislative process and hopefully they'll come back all rested and ready to get to work and maybe hearing from their constituents about what it is they want them to focus on. Again, I'll go back to the VPR poll. The economy and affordability was a big issue for a lot of our monitors. And I think that the legislators should take heed in that poll. Something that you pitched on your budget was income tax breaks for recently graduated nurses. Democrats don't seem to be crazy about that way of addressing the problem. They've agreed that there's a nursing shortage in the state but they want to look at things like tuition assistance or loan forgiveness or other ways. Why did you choose income tax breaks for that? It just looked like it was an easy way to accomplish what we wanted to do. And so as long as we agree to the goal, I think that that's a move in the right direction. So we'll work with them in trying to solve the problems that we have. We have a tremendous workforce shortage in the state. Nurses in particular. And again, with this latest outbreak in the coronavirus threat our country and our nation, our world, this is going to be even more crucial. So we'll work with them. I'm sure we'll come to some resolution on this. It doesn't look like the keynote proposal or the sports betting proposal in your budget you're going to get anywhere this year. What is- I don't think, I would not put a nail in that yet. I believe that there's still an opportunity that we move forward with that. We have, you know, Senator Sears. I think Senator Sears, Senator Stratkin had a bill for sports betting. You know, if you were a betting person you might think that that might move forward. Stratkin said they're going to do a study. I think that they support eventually getting there but they want to take a more slow cautious approach, figure out, you know, basically study it before you put it in place, a way to do it. Well, again, we've got another week or two before crossover and I still think there's an opportunity to move this at least across to the other body. Even if it's a study moving it over to the other body doesn't preclude it from being taken up. What do you see is the message from Super Tuesday, this remarkable consolidation on the Democratic side and Senator Sanders' prospects? Well, it's certainly, you know, what a difference a week makes in politics. A week ago, I don't think any of us would have thought that Joe Biden was even in the mix. Although we were talking about others but now he's the front runner. So it tells me that, you know, the electorate has a different, sometimes opinion than the pundits and so they ultimately decide. So it was an interesting, fascinating week, I think, in terms of politics. If it comes down to Biden and Trump, where were you? I think we'll wait and see where that ends up. Who knows who's going to be the nominee. Okay, thank you very much for coming today. Appreciate it.