Ocean State Placed on Travel Restriction Lists: A summary of the governor’s August 5 press conference

Governor Gina Raimondo, RIDE Commissioner Angelica Infante-Green, and DOH director Dr. Nicole Alexander-Scott gave the COVID-19 press briefing today at 1pm.

Today’s COVID data is as follows: DOH is reporting 84 new cases since yesterday. “Certainly better than the triple digits we’ve been having,” said the governor. Seventy-nine people are hospitalized for reasons related to the coronavirus. Of those, 14 people are in the ICU, and five of those people are on ventilators. DOH also reports one additional death, a person in their 80s.

The press conference started a few minutes late today, as the governor explained she was surveying damage from yesterday’s intense winds and rain. “It’s a serious storm, it came and went quickly,” she said. According to National Grid, 150,000 customers had power outages across the state. At the time of the press conference that number had been reduced to 70,000. Important to note: Customers frequently means households, not individual persons without power.

The big news at today’s press conference was the Ocean State’s recent placement by other states in New England on travel restrictions lists. New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut and others have mandated Rhode Islanders traveling to their states must be quarantined for 14 days or provide a negative COVID test. The governor was not surprised, saying, “We’ve consistently had days when we have over 100 new cases a day.” More than 11% of positive COVID-19 cases in Rhode Island are from state residents traveling to other states and then returning.

Social gatherings are still proving difficult for the state to control. The governor today repeated that the social gathering limit was 15 — 15 of the same people. Anyone violating the social gathering limit mandate without proper distancing or masks can expect a $500 fine for each individual at the gathering.

Rhode Island’s bars are failing to keep social congregations down. As a result, the governor today announced all bars should close by 11pm. Restaurants with bars could remain open for longer, but the bar area must be closed. The state has heard numerous reports of customers clustering at bars. Only 20% of bars are complying with DBR regulations to maintain some distancing or barrier separating bartenders from the customers.

Governor Raimondo also announced today the state had signed two new contracts with two commercial testing labs. Both have pledged to process 1,000 COVID tests daily. One of them, a local lab in North Kingstown by the name of Dominion Diagnostics, has said they will increase their capacity next month to 7,000. A low turnaround time on testing has proven key to contact tracing and combating the virus, as well as reopening schools later this month.

Any asymptomatic Ocean State resident between the ages of 18 and 39 can get a COVID test, the governor announced today. She wants to test as many young people as possible, as this age group has the largest proportion of percent positive cases. Interested parties should go to portal.ri.gov to schedule their test.

The state today broke down one of the metrics used to determine how schools could open later this month. That metric was the number of weekly cases in each town. Raimondo said today each town must have a weekly case incidence of fewer than 100 new cases per 100,000 people. Based on the data from last week, only Providence, Pawtucket and Central Falls would be unable to fully reopen their schools because of this one metric. Raimondo reminded listeners that there are four other metrics school districts must satisfy, including having a ready supply of PPE and a sufficient operational plan in place in case of outbreaks. “It really elevates the concept that as a state, we want to keep our eyes on the prize,” said Dr. Alexander-Scott.

Final decisions for which level schools will use to reopen will be handed down on the week of August 16. Raimondo also announced today the state will not force any student who does not feel safe to go to school. Distance learning and virtual options will be available to all students in the state.