LOUISIANA COVID 19 DECLINES - Louisiana reported 26 more COVID-19 deaths Tuesday, bringing the state's death toll to 4,195. But the trajectory of new cases and hospitalizations appears to be heading downward. 1,164 new cases were reported Tuesday for a total of 133,125. Although the Louisiana Department of Health has said that weekend case totals were likely artificially low due to a potential backlog in lab test reports, still hospitalizations fell by 47 Tuesday for a total of 1,335, and patients on ventilators dropped by one to 214 which shows some progress. During his Covid-19 update yesterday afternoon Governor John Bel Edwards credited recent Covid-19 declines to Phase 2 Mitigation Measures.
"We have more people wearing masks, staying home when they're sick, social-distancing when they're out, making sure that they're washing their hands and so forth," explained Edwards. "Obviously the degree to which we can get more adherence to these restrictions and mitigation meaures will actually show more progress."
Edwards also gave an update on President Trump’s recent Executive Order for a $400 weekly enhancement payment to the unemployed. The states will have to match $100 of that, if they can’t, the enhancement will be $300. At issue is whether or not Louisiana’s unemployment fund has enough money to do this.
"The balance of which is $253-million today, it was about $1-billion and 50-million or so on March the 1st and obviously the solvency of that fund is severely threatened," Edwards said.
Edwards explained that the state may have to borrow money from the Federal Government to restore the solvency of the State’s Employment Trust Fund but added this was was not a desired choice. The Democratic Governor also said he believes about about 200,000 of unemployed workers may not qualify for any enhanced benefit because they receive less than $100 a week in state unemployment benefits.
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