Louisiana set an all-time-high Tuesday for COVID-related hospitalizations at 2,112 as the Delta COVID surge tears through the largely unvaccinated Bayou State. To combat the seemingly unchecked growth in new cases Governor John Bel Edwards signed an order re-implementing the statewide mask mandate, the first Governor in the US to do so.
Edwards said just because the mandate doesn’t begin until tomorrow doesn’t mean you shouldn’t start masking up today.
“Do you give a damn? I hope you do, I do,” said Edwards. “I’ve heard it said often that Louisiana is the most pro-life state in the nation… I want to believe that. It ought to mean something. In this context, it ought to mean something.”
Louisiana has the fastest per-capita growth in new COVID cases in the nation, reporting over 4,700 new cases Tuesday. The state also saw 59 COVID-related deaths, the highest number since mid-January. A calculation of the positivity rate on Tuesday’s test showed the number over 20%.
Edwards said enforcement of the mandate will be just as it was the last time the state had a mandate in late April.
“We have 4.6 million people in Louisiana, tens of thousands of businesses spread across 64 parishes, we are not going to enforce our way through this,” said Edwards. “Either people are going to do what is required, what is necessary to achieve the result that all of these healthcare professionals are asking for, or they are not.”
The mandate is set to expire on September 1st.
Comments