Transcript
On Thursday President Trump signed the $8.3 billion spending bill to fund the government’s emergency response to the coronavirus outbreak.
The funding package includes $3 billion to help fund research, $2.2 billion for prevention, preparedness and response efforts with $950 million going to support state and local health agencies.
Even though more than 1 million coronavirus test kits have been sent out to American hospitals, the federal government is struggling to keep up with the demand.
Public health systems are overwhelmed with cases.
There are at least 335 cases and 17 deaths in 29 states.
14 of those deaths are in Washington state alone.
During his trip to the CDC on Friday, Trump promised millions more coronavirus tests will be made available for healthcare facilities in the United States.
Officials are holding press conferences every day to update citizens in their states.
Thankfully some of them have sign language interpreters.
Sign1News has been able to record parts of coronavirus press conferences in North Carolina, Maryland and Texas.
North Carolina health officials break down the risks in contracting the virus, Maryland is one of many states waving coronavirus testing costs and Texas officials assure its citizens that they and every other state is doing all it can to ensure American safety.
There’s been a lot of interest specifically on exact time frames and where would people go and I get that understanding people’s concerns “Was I at risk? “Was I exposed?” underlying a lot of questions around that time frame which is really important and really really valid question. So what I want to think talk through with you all is this concept of risk from our local health department so just remember that. What is considered at risk terms of contact is very close household close household contacts they are considered high risk. People who had sustained in close proximity contact with this person so less than 10 to 16 feet away from more than 10 to 20 minutes, that’s considered moderate risk. If you are just walking through a public setting. just walking through the airport walking to the grocery store walking through the library and by this person that is not considered a risk. So it really is those moderate and high risk people with the help of our local health departments are doing to identify and to monitor those. But just walking through RDU on that day of landing are not considered at risk.
Today under my authority during this state of emergency I am directing the Maryland Insurance Commissioner to require all state health insurers to waive any cost sharing, copayments, coinsurance or deductibles associated with the testing for the coronavirus. We also removing all prior authorization requirements by any health carrier for Covid-19 testing that are related to medical necessities. It is critical that anyone experiencing symptoms and meets the criteria for testing is able to do so right away without having any concerns whatsoever about the cost associated with it.
I would ask you to think of it in two ways. There are some things we can do and we are doing those things. We are doing them quite diligently spending a lot of hours in anticipation. But there are also things the public can do and I want remind you as I’ve said a couple of times. When you look at the other epidemics we’ve had the last couple of decades, they’ve ultimately been stopped because of a great coordination between the government and the people in the population. The people followed the advice. And those how SARS, MERS and even ebola, that’s how they were stopped. As a community, not just the government, but as a community a whole community we are incredibly powerful and incredibly capable of having a huge positive impact on what faces us from this virus.
Posted – 3.7.20