Governor Edwards announces the state is now in the “yellow” zone for COVID case growth after weeks of being in the “red” zone according to the feds.
Edwards says that means as a whole the state is now below 100 new cases per 100,000 residents over the last seven days and below ten percent positivity. He warns that could change if people start slacking on their spread mitigation behavior.
“But it won’t happen as long as we are doing what we are supposed to do which is wearing our mask, keeping six feet apart from people not in our immediate household, washing our hands frequently, staying at home when you are sick, as reducing your activity,” says Edwards.
Despite the progress, Edwards says the White House is still recommending the state maintain the bar closure and mask-wearing mandate.
While the state as a whole is doing much better over the past few weeks Edwards notes there are still some hotspot problem areas in 15 parishes that are still in the red zone.
Those problem parishes are mostly home to the state’s largest cities like New Orleans, Metairie, Shreveport, Lake Charles, Monroe, and Lafayette, Alexandria, and Baton Rouge. St. Tammany Parish is also on the list.
Despite this good news, Edwards says the combination of hurricane evacuations and school reopenings could reverse our progress, and due to a recent lack of testing, we just don’t know how much of an impact we will see.
Yesterday the state reported only 4,000 new tests. Throughout the rest of August, the state averaged nearly 20,000 new tests a day.
Comments