Hi, friends, hope you're hanging in there. Time for another press conference. #vtpoli
Phil Scott begins by noting that we've lost 4 more Vermonters in the last two weeks to COVID-19, and the state will be reporting 146 new cases today, a state record.
Scott asks Vermonters to follow the guidelines, and avoid meeting up with other households. "I know this is hard," he says, but advises "look around you." Hospitalizations are on the increase, cases are on the rise, and we are seeing people die.
"I'm pretty sure no one is doing this on purpose, but this disease spreads so quickly," he says, noting that without precautions, the virus spreads to vulnerable people. "The consequences are severe--maybe not for you, or your household, but for others."
Clarifying the regulations, Scott is going to offer updates now. "If you're in a dangerous or unhappy situation, you can leave and take shelter with another household." Also, individuals who live alone can get together with one other household.
Also, outdoor fitness activities including no more than two people from other households will now be allowed.
Scott pleads with VTers, "we need you to limit your contact" with other people, and now. Notes the CDC has also advised people to limit travel and not gather with other households for Thanksgiving. Says there's light at the end of the tunnel, "but we need to get to that light."
"Let's not forget that our sacrifices this spring and summer" put us in a position to open schools. "That was, and is, a great win for our kids, who benefit greatly by being back in their schools." Says keeping kids in school is one of the state's top priorities.
To drive that point home, Scott invites two students who are on the State Board of Education to join the press conference by video. Sabina Brochu and Angelita Pena.
Sabina starts by talking about a survey she helped to create to send to students, helping school officials know what students want and need this school year.
Angelita says 1077 students responded to the survey in early October, when there was an average of 11 new cases a day. So this data reflects a different time. Surveyed different high schools. Angelita goes to CVU, in Hinesburg.
Survey showed that in October, a majority of students were in their high school building 2 days a week. A majority of students surveyed said they felt protected when at school.
Students who felt protected said they observed students wearing masks properly, felt their was enough sanitizer and sanitization, and that people were being pretty good about social distancing.
Students who didn't feel well protected said they felt like other students weren't following social distancing protocol, and were sometimes not wearing masks properly.
The survey also asked about extracurriculars. Angelita & Sabina say students find extracurricular activities really important to their mental health and well-being, and they plead with Vermonters to follow guidelines so students can keep doing the things that help them feel good.
The survey also asked students how online learning was going. Students in October felt like they were learning better in online learning than they had been in the spring, but in-person education is still better, Sabina says.
Angelita says students are saying the online learning is worse or much worse than in person learning (though about a third actually say they prefer online). And that she knows students who are failing, and school needs to be in person to support the students who are struggling.
School still feels different, because of the hybrid model. Sabina says, "I haven't taken French or spoken a word of French since June." Says that will make jumping back into the language really difficult whenever she's able to take it again.
The survey also asked students how they felt their workload is this year, and the results show there's a lot of variation--some students have too much work, others don't have enough.
Survey shows some schools are doing really well in terms of having staff and students connect to one another and having staff/teachers communicate with and reach out to students. But other schools are really not doing well, according to student responses.
This is another reason why students want to be in-person, they say, because it's so much easier to connect with a teacher when you're having an issue or just have a quick question. This is having an impact on student learning, they say.
The students plead with Vermonters to help, by taking precautions, so students can go back to school--and feel safe.
They worry about going back to school after Thanksgiving and possibly bringing the virus back to their families. But they WANT to be in school, so if we can bring the case count down, students can be in school and feel safe.
Education Secretary Dan French now, to follow up. Says that while we continue to see cases in Vermont schools, schools are not a significant driver of transmission. And the benefits of in-person schooling is key to why keeping schools open is being prioritized.
French says schools may be one of the safest places for both students and staff.
On surveillance testing, about 9500 tests, 45% of school staff in VT, will be completed by the end of the day today. Second phase of testing starts next week.
French goes through data on how schools are implementing hybrid/in-person/remote schooling.
Health Commissioner Dr. Levine's turn now. Says the state reported 148 cases yesterday, 146 today. (So I was wrong earlier in the thread--yesterday was the record number of cases.)
Our 7-day average positivity rate for testing is 1.87%. Says many states are much higher, including some that are at nearly 50% positivity.
Looking at the outbreak that started with ice teams in Central Vermont. Says there are only 2 new cases since November 6th that can be identified with that outbreak.
24 outbreaks and 163 situations, which are instances where contact tracing identifies a possible exposure in a facility that requires notifying the facility, not just individual contacts (school, workplace, health care facility etc.).
Levine mentions the 4 deaths in the last two weeks, which include people who were living in long term care facilities. And notes the vulnerability of people who live in these situations, and our duty to protect them.
As cases mount, Levine says it's easy to see this as something that can't be controlled. "But this is not a runaway train...yet," he says. But it can only be controlled with the help of everyone to take precautions, follow the guidance, respond to tracers, isolate when needed.
Levine cautions patience in terms of looking at case numbers to determine whether or not our new guidelines will have an effect. Says we won't see the impact for a couple or even several weeks
Levine asks Vermonters to keep a record of others they're coming into contact with, in case tracing is needed.
And Levine reiterates the statement that schools are not driving transmission, and that few schools are having to close the entire building when there has been a case (though individual classrooms have frequently closed).
Levine says he knows that some Vermonters may be experiencing pressure from a friend or family member to come over for Thanksgiving. Suggests people go to the Health Dept.'s website to look at their "Covid Talk" advice for how to say no.
Levine says Pfizer is expected to file today for emergency use authorization for its vaccine. There's an accelerated process right now, but it COULD mean VT might start seeing a vaccine in our state by around December 10th.
We're in the Q&A now. I'm home and my daughter is asking for a "pickle and mustard sandwich, with a pickle on the side." So I'm going to multi-task for a few minutes.
Her sandwich looked so good I had to make one for myself, too. Plus some cukes and tomatoes, and a clementine. Yum. Anyway...
One question was about ski areas. From what I was hearing, there are no significantly new guidelines for ski areas. And there was also a question about test results and how long they're taking.
Mike Smith, Secretary of Human Services says many out-of-state labs are experiencing delays in test results, but Vermont labs and the Broad lab have been doing well. However, he does expect to possibly start seeing delays here, too, if testing numbers increase.
There was also a question about self-administered tests that people can order and then mail back themselves, and why results are coming back so much more quickly for those, but I didn't catch the specifics of the answer well enough to summarize.
Secretary Smith says any college students who test positive before departing campus to go home for break will need to remain in quarantine ON CAMPUS so they don't get sent home to their communities. Says it's safer to keep them on campus in quarantine while they're infectious.
Phil Scott says the contact tracing team has been "stressed" and there are people being added to the team as they scale up. (Deputy Health Commissioner Dolan told us on Monday the health dept. is not recruiting new tracing volunteers.)
Sec. Smith says the state expects to have 55-56 FTEs doing contact tracing. (FTE = full time equivalent. So they may have more actual people doing tracing, bu they have the equivalent of 55ish.) Each tracers can do 2-3 cases a day. Which gets us to tracing about 150 cases a day.
State should have 20 more tracers by Monday, another 10 the following Monday and another 20 or so the following week. So the state will be able to trace 250-300 cases per day.
They've also reorganized how the tracing goes, so they have "Tiger teams" that can reach out to all the contacts of positive cases to get them to quarantine quickly.
Dr. Levine says we need to get comfortable with the fact that the numbers we're seeing right now are going to continue in the short term, and might even go higher before they (hopefully) start trending down again.
Scott and Levine say 3 (of the last 4) Vermonters who died due to COVID-19 have been residents at Rutland Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center.
Mike Donaghue asks why the health dept isn't revealing the location of every pharmacy where a staff member has tested positive. Dr. Levine says just because there's a case, doesn't mean there's a risk to the public.
Donaghue says Vermonters should have the information so they can make a choice. Donaghue's position is always that the state needs to offer MORE information and specifics on places/people where there there have been positive cases (in schools, at pharmacies etc.) (cont.)
Donaghue sees it as hiding something or a lack of transparency. The Health Dept. sees it differently, saying it's not hiding something to not give specifics on every case. They're trying to provide info when they think the public needs to know for their own heath/safety, but..2/
...they need to balance individual rights to privacy with the public need to know. And they've said before that just because people WANT to know details doesn't mean they need to know, or have the right to know all the details. 3/
It's a fundamental difference in how these two entities (Donaghue and the health dept.) see these issues. And Donaghue clearly doesn't agree with their answers, because he asks a question along this line almost every press conference. 4/
My take: broadly speaking, this tension is helpful--ideally someone like Donaghue pushes people in power to be as transparent as possible. But in this case I do think he's missing some nuance and just doesn't like the answers he's getting so he keeps asking the same question.
Question from @WCAX_Cat about the specifics of vaccine distribution and storage. (But I was on a tangent so I missed some of the details. Tune in to WCAX for Cat's reporting on this!)
@WCAX_Cat State officials say they do have some capacity for the cold storage that appears to be necessary for some of the vaccines likely to get approval. But later vaccines (like the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine being studies at UVMMC) may require only regular refrigeration.
Labor Commissioner Harrington says he thinks the realistic unemployment number is more like 6-8%, even though the official number calculated through the federal formula is significantly lower.
The official rate is striking--Vermont's official unemployment rate for October, released today, is 3.2%, more than a 1 point drop over previous month. But that number certainly doesn't reflect the way many Vermonters are experiencing their own employment. National rate is 6.9%
A fellow tweep points out that my original tweet about the new guidelines for walking with friends may have been confusing. To clarify: individuals may now exercise outside with ONE individual from a separate household. Here's the amended executive order: governor.vermont.gov/sites/scott/fi…
Here’s the part many people have been wondering about! 
1pm. We're still 9 more reporters away from the end. (And my daughter has started playing with her NOISIEST toys, so prepare for the possibility of a "BBC Dad" audio moment in our broadcast analysis when this ends.)
((, but for radio.))
.@loladuffort asks about the state's threshold and metrics for how it would determine when to close schools. She points out that NYC schools were going to close when the positivity rate crested 3%, which just happened (and schools there closed).
Levine says the New York metrics have been criticized. And says VT is not creating a threshold or metric that would separate out schools specifically for closure. Positivity rate is one of many metrics, and any new restrictions wouldn't be directed just at schools.
Lola asks again if there's a plan in place, even if its variable and consists of many metrics, for school closures. Phil Scott steps in to say no, there's no plan being created that would specifically target schools.
The governor’s staff has released the slides from the two school presentations. I’ll share them here. First the survey from the two students on the State Board of Education. Part 1:
Part 2:
Here’s Ed Secretary Dan French’s slide presentation:
The governor's communications director, @RKelleyComms, notes the time and says she's going to have to keep all the remaining reporters to 1 question each, because she has to free the state officials on this call to do other work.
Meanwhile, my daughter has taken this opportunity to start drawing on her face. Good times!! :)
In response to a question from Steve Merrill, about masks again, Dr. Levine says the pandemic offers many opportunities to misapply science, and cherry-pick data to boost their own perspectives.
Almost done here!! I'm going to disconnect from Twitter (probably) to get ready to go back on the radio. I'll try to recap here when I'm done, if there's anything I miss.
My kiddo was miffed she wasn’t invited into my radio broadcast booth, otherwise known as a blanket fort, so she invited herself in. Thankfully, she also appreciated that being silent was an important part of this game. See you all on Tuesday! (When I’ll be back in the studio.)
Speaking of kids, you might want to play today’s episode of @ButWhyKids whether you’re a child yourself or not! Featuring the awesome @ayesharascoe of @nprpolitics fame. “Why Are We Still Talking About The Election?” dlvr.it/Rm5898 #vtpoli #Election2020 #kidslisten
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