Today, we have taken a number of have received 400 ventilators from the Strategic National stockpile on tuesday. They said more on the way and we are grateful, but we still need a lot more. We recently announced that detroit will be one of the first cities in america to receive five testing machines and 5000 kits. Used to testill be police and fire emf workers. It produces results in 15 minutes and that is fantastic. Each machine does one sample at a time so detroit will have the 050 results per hour and that is why it has to be focused on the frontline. President trump granted my request for a formal mission to allocate 3000 members of the daysgan army for up to 90 to perform humanitarian missions across the state. Helpwill do things like run a mobile screening facilities, distribute food and medical supplies, insure resiliency and supply lines, disinfect public spaces, and support Public Safety when required. Formally declared a state of disaster and sent a letter requesting a concurrent solution extending the state of emergency by seven days. Theave suspended requirement for lower vapor gasoline and paste a temporary restriction on nonessential veterinary procedures during the veterinary endemic pandemic. Businesses have stepped up and we are grateful. All are working on one or more of the following, face shields, respirators, masks, and ventilators. Has stepped up and is putting First Responders up so they do not have to worry about threatening their families, and thats a wonderful thing they are doing to support Delta Airlines is providing free flights for medical professionals who need help and we know michigan is one of those areas. Makingtools is countertops for businesses in the area to protect employees and patrons. Great lakes wine and spirits has begun working with local restaurants to send two meals a families, and high we are grateful that so many businesses are doing their part, small and large alike. Yesterday, we had 3334 cases, 337 deaths. It is incumbent upon every one of us to remember that each of those people was a michigander with a story with family and friends who cannot be mourned as we traditionally would because we cannot congregate. Stake, what is at michigan lives. Is a hotspot for covid19 cases. We are on the upswing and cases climb every day. We had 3000 more positive cases since i last sat in this chair on monday. We know that the apex will not end until the beginning of may. Reiterate that no one is immune from this virus. All walksall ages and of life are testing positive across the state every single day. This virus moves easily from person to person. Even if you dont feel sick, you could be carrying it. I was struck by a news i saw this morning of a special Education Teacher who passed away after three days of combating the symptoms. Had it as well and barely had a fever. That is why we all must act as though we could be carrying it. With this virus could infect another 40 and intern in fact 1000 more. We must do everything we can to protect our families, communities, dedicated health professionals, and everyone on the frontline. Ofid19 will touch every one our lives in some way or another and we all must do our part. Today, i am signing an executive order close School Buildings for the remainder of the calendar year. Instruction for k12 students will be suspended and all School Buildings will be closed for the remainder of the year. This does not mean our kids will stop learning. Each district must develop and alternative an alternative learning plan. The plans will be district different based on districts and within the best interest of kids in their communities. Online, projectbased learning, things that can be used as alternative modes of delivery instruction. Sure thatmust make their plans are appropriate and accessible for families in their school if the plan relies on some online instruction, the district should ensure that every student has access to an appropriate device. Students and families will not be punished if they are unable to participate. Is to ensurentent and implore all districts have a plan for graduating seniors. Educated workers will be paid for the remainder of the school year. I knowthis is hard and this raises a lot of questions from parents and students. I was getting Text Messages from my own child asking questions about how this is going to work. Is a lot of anxiety about how we are going to move forward to meet the needs of our kids. I feel it, too. I have a junior asking about missing about prom. And as a senior. I feel in our household. But this is the best thing we can do for our children, for the tens of thousands of educators who work in our schools. This will ensure more kids and educators will return to school happy and healthy at the start of next school year. Table protect more families from the spread of covid19. And it will help us return to life sooner. Over the past few weeks, weve seen teachers across our state step up and find creative ways can canoe desk continue continue reaching their students, like miss wilson from st. Johns, who wrote letters to students from class to let them know they are thinking of them. Or those providing meals to families, hosting zoom calls, and sending notes to students. Misses johnson, a kindergarten teacher, she and her colleagues drove through neighborhoods and waving at students. Took them two hours, but they wanted to make sure students knew they were there for them. Like lauren from stony creek, who created a virtual band room, setting up time for them to collaborate with professional musicians. And nora in detroit, who makes daily video lessons for her kids while her husband, lane, a district chef, helps provide meals for them. Our teachers number one aiority is ensuring a great education for our kids. I know this will be tough and it will require creativity and hard work and problemsolving. Service,me in public ive met educators across our state who i know are eager to rise to this challenge. Our teachers are some of the hardest working people i know. I know that they will help guide our students through this tough time. In mywill do everything power to support them and help guide them through this. I also [no audio] parents who have spent every day with their kids, trying to keep them entertained and inspired, trying to keep them reading and working on math or science with them. Being a parent is one of the hardest and one of the best jobs there is. Im grateful for those of you who have continued to work from home and take care of your kids. I know its hard and when your kids get older, they will remember these days, when they got to spend a little more time with their parents. Theyll remember the activities that you did together. They will be grateful, ultimately, that we all pulled together to meet their needs. Im imploring you also to make sure as you are engaging with your kids, youre educating them in an ageappropriate manner, how to learn about what is happening in our world right now and how to cope with it. These last few weeks have been tough for michiganders. They been tough for all americans. But we know right here in michigan, we have got a big challenge. Workers, and our all of our Mental Health has been stretched. This is a challenge unlike anything we faced before. Many of you tune in hoping for good news, hoping ill Say Something that shows were ready to turn back to life as normal. I ask that until that day comes, you keep making smart choices. I ask that everyone can volunteer in Health Care Centers or donate blood or money to their food bank or medical supplies. Covi19. Ichigan. Gov fight ovid10. C stay home. Stay safe. I want to thank the men and women in our Grocery Stores in culver and meyer, and people making sure we have food. Editorialthink services cleaning these environments so that when we are out, were safer. I want to thank the teachers and our nurses and doctors, respiratory therapists, and everyone in our health care system. With that, i want to turn it over to the person i learned the most from, our chief medical exec of. Thank you. A huge9 continues to be Public Health crisis. Were not sure of the exact date when cases are going to peak, but we are still on the upslope. Weve identified more than a thousand new cases each day over the past few days. As of yesterday, as the governor mentioned, michigan had 9,334 cases and 337 deaths. We expect to announce more cases and more deaths later today. Weve talked a lot about articles when it comes to the Public Health strategy in michigan. We do not have a vaccine and we dont have an antiviral treatment. Because of that, social distancing is the one thing we must do and do very well to get ahead of this farce. We must prevent this virus. We must prevent as many as possible from getting this disease. The elderly and those who have underlying mill drooling medical conditions. We also have to understand that no one is immune. There are people who are young. There are people who do not have underlying medical conditions who are getting sick and are dying. We must heed the executive order to stay home in a safe space. People must stay home if they are sick. We have evidence that even if you feel well, you could still be spreading the disease to others. Do not leave your house unless you absolutely must. And maintain the cash social distancing social distancing while you are out. We know that many of our hospitals on the front lines, taking care of patients, are at capacity right now. Intensive care units are full, hospitals are running low on masks and gowns. And if they have them, some are needing to reuse that between patients. We also know some are running low on critical medications like albuterol and sedation medications, medications that are necessary to help people breathe or make sure they are softly safely maintained on a ventilator. The state is working as hard as it can to support our hospitals. Ive truly been humbled by the number of people who have reached out to get masks or volunteer their services. Our colleagues in the federal government have been listening and have sent us some pulse some supplies, although we know it will not be enough. We will work around the clock to get our hospitals the supplies they need. Weve also identified that tcf center in detroit, as they cite for some patients who have covid19. Given the trajectory of covid19 in the state, we will likely need additional facilities. We will also need additional medical professionals, doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, and others who staff them. Please, if you have the skills and are available, go to our website, www. Mic higan. Gov fightcovid19 to sign up. The next few weeks are going to be difficult. I encourage everyone to take this seriously anti h and to heed the governors orders to stay home and stay safe. Gov. Whitmer with that, ill open it up to some questions. Reporter can you speak a little bit about how this decision was reached to close the schools . I know its been several weeks. What was the decider parents have been wondering. What was the deciding factor . Gov. Whitmer so, how did we arrive at this decision on the school year . Not lightly, ill tell you that. Based onion was made communication with our chief sawcal perspective as we the chief medical examiner across the country. School is places were kids congregate. Its important we pull our kids out. Weve seen other kids take action. But before we made any pronouncements, we had a plan. It was a plan that took into account we have 1. 5 million children in michigan in our people cap. Weve got pupil count. Own set of assets and their own set of challenges. Thats precisely why when a pronouncement was made that we take these things into consideration, talking with our department of education, talking with the leaders in the legislature, both sides of the aisle, talking with frontline educators, the true experts here, this we think now is the right moment to say heres how we anticipate moving forward to meet the needs of our kids. This is how were empowering School Districts. This is how we are leaving some of the restrictive things, and this is how we can, as a state, start to move forward on individualized plans for districts so they have the tools to meet their kids that they serve. There are parents right now who are obviously home because they cant go because of the previous executive orders. But at some point, what happens when you have all the students who are out of school, because School Buildings are closed, but parents now might be let back to go to work . How does that factor into your decision and what do you anticipate Going Forward for that . Gov. Whitmer at this juncture, we think were probably a good month out from the apex of covid19. It spreading very fast. We dont have enough tests to have confidence that we know precisely how many people are carrying covid19. Thats why weve had to take aggressive steps to mitigate the threat. With regard to whether theres a lead between weather printer back to work and kids are back in the classroom, thats a real possibility. But at this point, our decisions have to be made centered with what is in the best interest of the health of our kids and families and teachers . Thats precisely why we think this is the right step now. If perchance the world can go back to normal before the end of this calendar year, that would be a great issue that we would have to confront. But this point in time, the most responsible thing we can do is move forward, to work with ists and local districts to fashion a plan that meets the needs of the kids that we serve. Reporter governor, at least one of the legislatures Republican Leaders has said that hes not ready to agree to your request for an extension of the executive order. What are your thoughts on that and where do you those where do those discussions stand . Gov. Whitmer a couple of things. Michigan is on the front end of taking aggressive steps. It is the smartest thing we can do. We finally see other states following suit. Thats good. Theyre a little bit late to the science and decisions people are making. We are not near the end of covid19 in the state of michigan. As we look at modeling, we know that we are in for a tough three, four, five, six weeks in front of us. We are far from out of the emergency that we find ourselves in. Weve got to retain every tool we can to combat covid19 to keep people safe. But legislatures insistence on coming in next week is something i import them not to do. We already lost a member to suspected covid19. Member househe 110 has lost their lives already. Its inadvisable for them to congregate and start meeting. The best thing we can do is to say this new order, we have to come back for at least 28 days. When they do, we have an extension for as long as 70 days as is necessary. If its not, great, but lets go the route we need to take to protect people. This emergency powers, they been used many times before, not in a situation like this, i grant it, but in less less serious times, they extend much longer than 70 days. For a sinkhole, for instance, for the crisis in flint, this is a time where we have a unique crisis on our hands. People are dying in our state. Its important we have the protections for healthcare workers, and that all depends on extending this emergency. I asked the legislature think seriously about embracing this 70 day extension. It doesnt mean its embracing an extension for every other order ive issued. It simply means we acknowledged we are going to be in this emergency and we are going to have unique powers during this time to combat covid19 and stabilize. Reporter going back to the school topic, a lot of parents are confused about what this means in terms of advancing their kids for the next year or not. I know you said it was important to get those graduating seniors through, as well. Can you tell parents what their options are in terms of continuing this school year and advancing to the next clear . Gov. Whitmer yeah, so they will be working with their districts. What we want to make sure is no student is penalized because of covid19, that they are not held back because of this Global Crisis that were confronting. Thats precisely why were encouraging districts to put together their district learning plans so they are meeting the needs, acknowledging some of the challenges within the School District so every district has the ability to move on to the next great. Grade. Need ash grade we also need to recognize there will be challenges when school resumes. Thats precisely why the legislature is important as we think about resuming them in the fall. Reporter you mentioned the fall and coming back. If districts have different plans, they have different access, so you can have a district where most people have access to pretty highperforming districts you also have districts where there access isnt there, whether its rural or urban settings, are you concerned about the gap that could be created in the next month or two, and then expanding on that, in the fall . And what conversations need to adjusting the standards for what thirdgraders are supposed to know, what fifthgraders are supposed to know . Gov. Whitmer i appreciate the question. Challengeching on the we have with over 900 School Districts across the state, 56 ists. We know that if you are in one part of our state or another, it can be vastly different access to resources, to broadband, to all of the kind of different challenges the districts have. Theyre not uniform. Thats precisely why ive been pushing an equitable formula in the budget. Districts do not have equitable access to all of these things. Thats why its not onesizefitsall. It has to be determined at the local level so that the needs of kids are met, acknowledging the unique challenges districts are following across the space. What were you thinking about in terms of a start date for the coming school year . Gov. Whitmer well, i think we are making decisions right here and now based on the best science and the best data that we can get our hands on. We need more testing. We need to be doing robust testing in order to really assess when and how it safe to resume life. And that includes what School Looks Like in the fall. At this juncture, what we know is that it will be too dangerous to have kids congregating across the state right now. Thats going to be true for the foreseeable future. Thats why the time to move forward with a distancelearning plan for our children, because we acknowledge that if we dont hit our apex until late april or mid may, the school year is pretty much over. Thats why we cant wait to see what happens. Weve got to make plans to meet the needs of our kids. So far, with the fall looks like, i dont think we can, with any certainty, so we can start precisely on this day. We are giving districts flexability. We have gotten rid of standardized testing requirements. If they want to move to a balanced calendar, they have the ability. We need to work with legislature to make sure weve got supportal resources to the unique challenges schools are going to want to meet and are going to need to be devising at the local level. I think those are all factors that would go into answering your question. But i think that working with the people on the ground, the true experts in education on their student bodies, is how we proceed and get the best results for our kids. Reporter weve got a lot of people on Facebook Live asking about unemployment. Thousands have been applying for it, but they are either not getting a response or having a hard time getting the assistance that theyve been needing. Can you give us an update on if theres going to be any changes to the system, if theres an Unemployment Task force, anything to support the people of michigan affected by this . Gov. Whitmer each of these orders that have issued ive said it before and its worth repeating they weigh heavily on me. There are a lot of people unemployed and excited that comes with that, trying to confront with people completely overwhelmed because there are so many unemployed. Its not just michigan, but across the country. Our system has been able to stand up to the demand, but it does need support and were working on that. In the interim, what weve done is release and loosen some of the previously required actions on behalf of applecare. So, a used to be you had to get documentation from your former employer to be eligible. Were going to make it easier for people to apply. My encouragement for folks is that, keep attempting to get the application in, but know that we understand the incredible strain on the system, the number of people impacted, and were going to work to ensure people get the unemployment they need to get through this crisis. Reporter were seeing questions about masks and whether people should be Wearing Masks whether they are out in public. Now they are starting to require masks. Is there any consideration as to making such a requirement here in michigan . Gov. Whitmer im going to go give that one to the doctor. Theres no question that our frontline hospital workers dont have enough masks. If there is an n95 mask or surgical mask, we wanted to go to our hospital partners. That said, we know people might have amassed at home or they might be a mask at home or they might be able to make a mask or bandana. If they can, they should consider it. It certainly wont cause any harm. Reporter has there been any consideration of a curfew, state liquor . Not whitmer we have discussed a statewide curfew at the structure. I will say it this juncture. I will say that the expense or growth of covid19 is something im concerned about. We know the hospitals are at capacity in many parts of our state. We know that this great testing that was set up in the city of detroit has shown there was a much higher prevalence of covid19 than anyone anticipated. The more testing we do, the better. We see numbers going up and that is concerning for people. The more testing we do, the better handle we can get on how prevalent this is and make educated decisions. I know that mayor of flint went forward with a case this week. Thats being talked about in our sister states. At this juncture, we have not had that conversation. Were anticipating and analyzing each of the actions other areas are taken to be aggressive and to be on the forefront. So, i would anticipate a conversation about that, but theres not been one yet and theres not a decision right now either. Were stillctor, seeing lots of people congregating in public spaces still open despite the social distancing recommendations. Can you just reiterate the importance of continuing to social distance during this time . People are still congregating. Thats just absolutely unacceptable. This is so incredibly important that people stay home. No one is immune. You can be 25 years old, healthy, no medical problems, you can easily get the coronavirus, and you can potentially die. I need everyone to understand this is incredibly serious. Take it seriously. Say home and stay safe. Reporter there are a number of students who have special Needs Services that are provided through the schools, ieps, etc. Can you talk a little bit about what you expect of districts and work with those students in the wide variety of Students Services they provide . Other exemptions for those services . Gov. Whitmer we recognize there are students with special needs across michigan and we went districts to support students and their ieps and the full systems if they are able. We recognize there are unique challenges and a situation where you cant have persontoperson contact, and that is something that is an issue. If the Student Needs Occupational Therapy services, it may require that additional sessions will be needed after the state of emergency is over, and we are mindful of that. And when this executive order expires, that is something we will work on. Those services are not canceled. They may need to be delayed, but we dissipate living up to the ieps our students rely on, that our families rely on, as well. Reporter on the school year, what other options, if any, did you consider . Gov. Whitmer i dont know that there are a lot of great options. I think the question was how do we ensure we are empowering districts to meet the challenges that they confront and make use of assets they might have available . I think the biggest challenge, disparatehat with the educational system that we have in michigan, that there are very different challenges across our state. And is not just flipping a switch and sing everyone can go online. Broadbent is not available. Not every child has access to a device. Not every School District has the ability to devise and instruct an online course that meets the needs of the kids. Thats why this really has to be in Close Partnership with the local leadership, to ensure that each trial has access to the kind of Distance Learning that theyre going to need. Thank you, everybody. Cspan has roundtheclock coverage of the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic, and its all available on demand at cspan. Org coronavirus. Watch what has briefings, updates from governors and state officials. Track the spread throughout the u. S. And the world with interactive maps. Much on demand any time, unfiltered, as he spent. Org coro cspan. Org coronavirus. Cspans washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up friday morning, the professor of epidemiology and medicine and i cap director discusses the latest in the u. S. Response to the coronavirus pandemic. Then staff writer thomas frank talks about how federal agencies like fema and the army corps of engineers are responding to the pandemic. And illinois democratic congressman danny davis on how the current coronavirus pandemic affected his district, and statewide in illinois. Watching cspans washington journal, live at 7 00 friday morning. Join the discussion. Governor edwards talked about louisianas response to the coronavirus pandemic, announcing social distancing through april 30. He said the large increase in the confirmed cases have mostly been a result of backlogged testing labs. This is 35 minutes. Gov. Edwards so, as i mentioned, im aware of how startling these numbers are. There is some context for these numbers. 95 of the positive results that we announce today are from tests
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